


And Then Some

by Chancy_Lurking



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fandom Trumps Hate 2020, Feral Behavior, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Multi, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Omega Bucky Barnes, Pack Dynamics, Past Abuse, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Protectiveness, Rescue Missions, Scenting, Soul Bond, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:53:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 27,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27297454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chancy_Lurking/pseuds/Chancy_Lurking
Summary: Steve can just look at him and Sam will feel the rush of their shared affection soak his heart like they’ve been bonded for years. When they’re alone and Sam sets his nose against Steve’s throat, he smells like love. He still smells like the rest of Sam’s life.Even that, though, is not enough to fill the newly torn open chasm of grief in Steve. That’s not going away, not without Bucky back where he belongs. Sam gets that and he’s going to help with everything he’s got. Because he’s a damn good friend, but also a veteran. Bucky’s been at war too long for Sam to ever feel alright with himself if he didn’t help bring him home, Steve’s feelings aside.(Sam and Steve are just settling into their relationship when Bucky crashes back into the land of the living, half-feral and drugged out of his mind.)
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers/Sam Wilson, Steve Rogers/Sam Wilson
Comments: 79
Kudos: 163
Collections: Fandom Trumps Hate 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZepysGirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZepysGirl/gifts).



> Boo! Happy Halloween!
> 
> This is my FTH fic for ZepysGirl, who has been so sweet and patient with me even though this fic was supposed to be done before the plague. Thank you so much for taking a chance with me and I hope you enjoy your fic!
> 
> And a round of raucous applause for tiltedsyllogism and Fangirlshrewt97 who very kindly took scalpels to my first draft and nudged it into the correct shape. I couldn’t have done it without you both, so thank you, thank you!

Growing up, Sam didn’t really see himself in love stories.

Always told in warm, glowing detail, the love stories Sam heard were always about an Alpha catching an omega’s scent and chasing that high right to their happily ever after. The kind of stories that never really helped when Sam spent a big part of his adolescence carefully rehearsing _straight_ reasons that he only ever smelt like other Alphas.

The excuses didn’t always work, though, and Sam had to face up to what that meant for him pretty young.

Even in the moment, he had known his dad had meant to be encouraging in his own messed up way. The world was even less accepting than it is now and Sam had come home smelling a little too much like another Alpha’s musk to be explained away. All things considered, of all the horror stories Sam has heard whispered from other queer Alphas, it was better than Sam had braced himself for. The shock and pity on his dad’s face made his stomach sink, but it wasn’t as hurtful as anger would have been.

Sam had stood stiffly in the doorway to the kitchen he hadn’t expected anyone to be in, while his dad had carried on with sympathy even though he couldn’t _possibly_ understand.

“ _The day I met your mom,_ ” he said, same as he always did, now tinged with worry instead of the usual swell of love, “ _I thought to myself, ‘that’s what love smells like’ and that’s what home is to me. What built this family._ ” He opened a window like an accusation and Sam internally winced, holding his tongue. “ _Don’t worry about the crap you get into between here and there, Sam. You got a great om’ out there waiting for you._ ”

That didn’t feel true, not that night when he’d dutifully replied “ _Yes, sir_ ,” and went to shower, angry and ashamed in a way he couldn’t vocalize. Not years later, when he stopped leading omegas on, knowing it wasn’t going where they wanted, but still hadn’t managed to let another Alpha lay hands on him before his first tour.

Then he joined the 58th only for a hotshot pilot—the only omega in the squadron—to smile at him like Sam was an old friend he was heartened to see again. Sam felt that smile in his chest and, for a hot minute, thought his dad may have had a point back then, if a slightly off-color one.

Riley didn’t smell like home, exactly, but he did smell like the sky and hot metal and being vulnerable. His heats didn’t clog Sam’s nose with the scent of being wanted more than good sense, didn’t make him nauseous with his own desire. After years of doubting and shame, he let himself think it, just for a moment, that he could fit into that box if Riley was beside him, that maybe that meant _they were—_

Then Sam had come home and Riley hadn’t and Sam had never wanted to smell the sky again.

*

Running is as close as Sam can get to flying for a long time, the wind in his face at the speed of a jog as much as his heart can take. The nightmares get better, as does the gut-wrenching terror at the thought of flying, but he keeps running anyway.

The funny thing is, Sam actually winds up running right into Steve, in the exact way everyone told him he would eventually find his omega.

One morning, a polite “ _On your left,_ ” from behind him is the only warning he gets before the air around him shifts with the scent of the Alpha jogging past him.

Sam’s legs almost give out.

With eyes on his back, Sam notices the slight stumble in the man’s previously perfect stride, a tiny sparkle of delighted surprise in his scent instead of the stab of shocked disgust he gets from some Alphas. That’s enough for Sam to lose any hope of thinking about anything else for the rest of the day. It’s not like—he doesn’t think about _love,_ not directly, that’s too Hallmark even for him, but he does think _yes._

He thinks ‘ _yes_ ’ and knows what it means, abruptly, to be led by the nose to the ends of the earth. A stranger’s scent has his heart pounding like he’s run a full marathon; it takes all his good sense and self-control combined to clamp down on his urge to _chase_. No heat has ever made him feel that level of primal hunt instinct. A beta walking nearby flinches away from him and he instantly feels guilty, raising his hands and lowering his eyes as he slows out of her way.

Then the guy has the nerve to _lap him_. His “On your left,” is a little less absent now, said directly to Sam instead of just casually to a passing jogger. Sam still feels like a scuzz for breathing in as deeply as he does, but he’s easily able to pick out the amusement and interest and _challenge_ crackling in the air between them. It makes him speed up instinctually, rising to the bait like a fool.

It takes him that second lap to realize he’s jogging with _Captain fucking America_.

“Don’t say it,” Sam grits under his breath when he hears the quick footfalls behind him, immediately breaking into a determined sprint. He hasn’t a hope in hell, he knows that, and the realization sends his heart right up into his throat. If Steve Rogers wanted to catch him, Sam wouldn’t be able to outrun him for more than two steps, if that. “Don’t you say it!”

“On your left!” Steve warns him anyway as he blows past Sam so quickly it almost hurts his feelings.

Really, though, he’s more impressed—and maybe a little turned on—as his body starts begging him to return to a light jog. He gives in eventually, already well past the three miles he meant to run this morning. He slows to a stop as the blond quickly makes his way around the bend.

It’ll be an annoyingly short amount of time before they cross paths again.

Sam hesitates a moment, some ingrained training telling him not to show submissiveness to another Alpha, overshadowed only by his own desire to do so. He’s tired and hot, in more ways than one. There’s no reason to win this race; he doesn’t _want_ to win, not really, even if he could. On a whim, he starts a timer on his watch before he sits down to stretch while he waits to be caught.

This time, Steve slows in his approach, following his nose right to Sam where he’s resting against a tree.

“Need a medic?” he asks, cheeky fucker, but Sam laughs as he squints up at him.

Steve Rogers smells like the rest of Sam’s life.

It’s such a stupid thing to think. _Surely_ , it _should_ take more than one conversation (and one that Sam nearly flubs, at that) to come to that kind of conclusion, but—well.

A few days later, Steve shows up at his job, smelling like relief and happiness just by being near Sam again. They smile at the exact same moment, the hapless smile of people who know they’re absolute goners. It’s a complicated thing, the excitement and nervousness Sam feels. It earns them a few looks, like everyone around is a little too aware of how long they’ve been looking at each other, how close together they’re standing.

In all the stories Sam has heard about Captain America, he’s never seemed like the type to shrink under scrutiny.

In the stories Sam has told about himself, neither has he, so he asks Steve out on a date.

It is maybe one of the best dates Sam has been on in a very long time. Up to and including the fact that Steve doesn’t end it by pounding his back and letting go too quickly just to make their hug seem socially acceptable between two Alphas. Even standing on Sam’s doorstep, he lets the hug linger, his face pressed coyly into Sam’s shoulder, leaving Sam tingling all down his back.

“It’s easier for guys like us nowadays, right?” Steve asks after a moment.

Sam’s laugh comes out a little more choked than he means for it to, but he rubs Steve’s back. “A lot of things are, yeah, but I doubt you’ve ever been one to back down from a fight.”

It succeeds in getting a laugh out of Steve, too. “Never did know when to quit.”

“Got an opinion about that, actually,” Sam pulls back to say, smirking into Steve’s face.

Steve eyes him curiously. “Yeah?” he says, then inhales slowly when Sam leans forward, barely a half inch that stirs their breaths.

“Don’t quit now,” Sam dares him and the last word is smothered by Steve’s lips.

Then Sam’s steering wheel is getting snatched out of his car, because when is his life ever that simple.

That’s not quite the correct series of events, but to be fair, he’s new to this whole being a part-time Avenger thing. The most exciting thing to happen in his life before that was Steve asking to be bitten—and not even in the heat of the moment! So, you’ll have to forgive Sam for being a little fucking startled to suddenly get thrown out of his car on the freeway and shot at in broad daylight.

Worse is trying to focus on providing cover fire while he is getting the startling echoes of Steve stumbling towards what feels like a full-on _rage_. When Sam finally gets close enough, Steve’s scent has gone all soaked through with panic and confusion and so much grief it’s knocking around inside Sam’s ribs. They’re surrounded now, but everyone seems afraid to get close to an _Alpha Super Soldier_ about to come completely unglued and Sam has a horrible flash of them loading Steve up with bullets and claiming they didn’t have a choice.

Sam has never been one to shrink because of a posturing Alpha and he isn’t going to start today, not even for Captain America. He holds his hands out and gets right in Steve’s face, doesn’t waver at his growling, “ _Steve._ ”

The calm he projects at Steve feels faint against the storm inside him, but it’s immovable, shored up by Sam's desire to get them out of this in one piece. Maria Hill showing up to keep them from getting thrown down a hole is useful, but Sam would like to think he had a hand in the success of the endeavor.

“Sam…” Steve starts to explain, but they don’t have the time and Sam isn’t ready to compartmentalize whatever he’s about to say. It must show on his face, because Steve shutters when he looks at him, changes course, “Thank you.”

Sam lets that ride, because what choice does he have? He buckles down for the biggest damn fight he’s ever joined because that’s what he does, especially when everyone needs him to.

After, Sam doesn’t even have to say anything. He steps up to Fury’s grave right beside Steve, close enough to feel his warmth and get caught in the echoing waves of grief riding under everything else. “It’s Barnes, then?” he asks.

The name sends a shard of pain through Steve’s scent, eyes sliding closed for a moment. “I didn’t even recognize his scent,” he says softly.

“He may not be the same guy anymore,” Sam says gently and has to swallow against the agony radiating off Steve. “It’s been seventy—”

“There’s no time limit, he was _Mine_ ,” Steve grits out and… it hurts.

_Shit_ , does it hurt to have it laid bare what they wouldn’t have if not for grief. He’d known, but hearing it said out loud so plainly reminds him that their relationship only happened following the biggest loss Steve has ever experienced. And now he’s got a chance to correct that, to get his actual, literal soulmate back.

Sam can’t find his voice at first, even when Steve’s expression buckles in realization, Sam’s feelings bleeding into the back of his mind. “Sam—”

“No, I know, Steve,” Sam says, because he does, truly. He gets it. He may not have ever had a mate, but he can think of what it would do to him to be told to leave _anyone_ he loves to the fate Barnes’ got dealt. Sam is nothing if not empathetic to that and far too grown to throw a tantrum about it. “So, let’s get him back.”

That’s all there is to do.


	2. Chapter 2

They’re taking down any Hydra base they come across on what Sam is internally calling ‘ _The Great American Bucky Hunt_ ’ which is frankly doing great things for them in the eyes of The United States Government.

Steve doesn’t feel the need to let them know that punching Nazis is just a very therapeutic collateral to finding the love of his life, so Sam doesn’t feel the need to entertain the thought. It already takes up more than its fair share of his brain power when he’s _not_ in a firefight. Usually, Sam would give voice to it; if anything has stayed with him through the process of becoming a certified counselor it’s how easy it is to suffocate on the words stuck in your throat. Blunt usually works for him and he’s not really looking to reshape his whole personality at nearly thirty.

Still, he’s no more a cruel man than Steve is. He’s not going to use his “ _I love you_ ” when it feels too much like taking a shot to hurt. It’s true, _God_ , it's so true they don’t even need words. Steve can just look at him and Sam will feel the rush of their shared affection soak his heart like they’ve been bonded for years. When they’re alone and Sam sets his nose against Steve’s throat, he smells like love. He still smells like the rest of Sam’s life.

Even that, though, is not enough to fill the newly torn open chasm of grief in Steve. That’s not going away, not without Bucky back where he belongs. Sam gets that and he’s going to help with everything he’s got. Because he’s a damn good friend, but also a veteran. Bucky’s been at war too long for Sam to ever feel alright with himself if he didn’t help bring him home, Steve’s feelings aside.

It turns out to be something of a moot point; Bucky finds _them_ when they’ve managed to get separated in the chaos of the latest Hydra base and Sam is about a twitch away from getting shot to swiss cheese.

Jammed into the back corner of the server room he’d been raiding, Sam is reloading his gun and halfway through saying, “Cap, I’m pinned down, northwest corridor—” when the gunfire abruptly shifts away from him. The guy in the doorway barely has time to shout “ _oh, fuck!_ ” before the important bits of him hit the wall behind his head.

Sam doesn’t immediately make the connection between his would-be-killers getting shot and Bucky. He’s honestly thinking Natasha tracked them down from her solo mission and just decided to show off her scary good timing. It isn’t until everyone else in the hall is dropping, too, that even through all the spilled blood, a new smell hits him.

Under a haze of chemicals, the unpleasant scent of a distressed omega has Sam’s senses zeroing down to almost nothing beyond the urge to protect.

“ _Falcon?_ ” Steve’s voice comes to his ear, tight with concern from where he’s still fighting his own way out across the complex. Something explodes in the background and Sam feels the rumbles of it under his own feet. “ _Falcon, respond! Do you copy!?_ ”

“Stand by,” Sam answers around his heart in his throat.

Stepping out into a field of bodies to see Bucky standing there is less of a shock than it should be.

Nowadays, all special op soldiers go through training against hormonal responses; it’s a standard procedure and Sam had passed with flying colors. Being inclined towards other Alphas may have had a hand in that. Today, though, the effort he has to put in to not start growling in Bucky’s defense is startling. Bucky smells exactly like he was created to make Sam buckle, to scatter his thoughts so thoroughly he loses track of the danger Bucky poses. Still, he’s _trained_. For all the alarms going off in his head, screaming for him to grab Bucky and hide, maul anyone who tries to stop him, he doesn’t take his hand off his semiautomatic, tries to keep his breathing shallow.

Bucky looks... honestly, he looks like hell.

The weight of the assault rifle in Bucky’s hands seems like it’s all he can stand to hold and even that’s leaving him unsteady. He has a feverish tint to his cheeks where he’s standing like a specter at the end of the hall, his gun low and face angled away in a visible display of not wanting a fight. The tension he’s carrying seems to have more to do with staying upright, like if Sam were to speak too loudly, he’d crumble right through the floor.

The muffled commotion in the rest of the building never leaves Sam’s awareness, but Bucky looks like the only real threat here is Sam. It’s admittedly not a great feeling.

“Been looking all over for you, man…” Sam says slowly, because it’s been an awfully convoluted path to get here just to have Bucky fall into his lap. He eyes him carefully, almost regretting the words when Bucky blanches. “You coming with me?” he continues evenly.

Bucky doesn’t quite look him in the eyes as he tilts his head, more like a twitch than a nod, but he steps carefully closer to Sam, still facing away.

Sam doesn’t exactly trust Bucky, but he doesn’t think the guy would save him just to shoot him in the back. He smells almost unbearably stressed, but it’s not pouring out quite so thickly now that he’s been invited into Sam’s space. It’ll have to do for now, until they’re out of this lab anyway. He nods back with more confidence than he feels and taps his earpiece.

“Change of plans, Cap, fall back,” Sam says, moving towards the exit that is, thanks to Bucky, much less of a hassle. Bucky falls in line just behind his shoulder.

“ _What?_ ” Steve’s voice comes back sharply. “ _I’m not leaving you. If you’re still pinned down, I’m coming to—_ ”

Sam feels such a sharp lurch of love for this idiot he wonders vaguely if he can feel it. He almost doesn’t want to tell him the truth, lest it send him sprinting through bullet hell with nothing but a pretty face and a hard head. “I have _Barnes_ ,” he interrupts urgently, “and we’re falling back.”

Steve’s shock pinches in Sam’s stomach even from this distance. “ _Did you say—?_ ”

“You heard me,” Sam answers, cutting his eyes briefly towards Bucky before snapping back to their exit. “Can you get out or do you need back up?”

“ _Don’t worry about me_ ,” Steve says and, for what may be the first time, Sam thinks he sounds out of breath. “ _Do you need—_? _Is Bucky—_?”

They both know ‘okay’ would be far too strong of a word even in the best case, so Steve doesn’t finish the question and Sam doesn’t bother trying to answer. “We’ll meet you back at the truck,” he says, because it’s the only thing he can really say with reasonable confidence.

Steve hesitates because, in this one instance, he has to. He was already going to come if Sam was in trouble. But now his—now Bucky is here and Sam doesn’t know if Steve’s self-restraint is going to win.

“Steve,” Sam says in a low voice as he clears a corner, shooting the guy at the end of the hall just as Bucky shoots his partner. “There’s just going to be more people shooting at us if you make a beeline in our direction and they figure out _The Winter Soldier_ is here. Trust me.”

It’s dirty pool, but ultimately it works. “ _I—ok, I do. I do, Sam,_ ” and to his credit, he doesn’t sound remotely hesitant about saying so; he sounds confident. “ _Make sure nobody tails you,_ ” he warns anyway.

Sam barely has time to feel annoyed at that, ready to remind Steve exactly which one of them had the most recent combat training when there’s a sound behind them. He pivots immediately, ready to shoot, but before Sam can blink, Bucky has double-tapped the guy. Bucky's scent is a riot of emotions all trying to seep out past whatever suppressants he’s on, but Sam isn’t familiar enough with him to parse them all out into easy categories, not really. Body language is a pretty easy read, though, because Bucky is coiled up for a fight. He put his body physically between Sam and the threat, his breath a near silent hiss between clenched teeth.

When Bucky glances back at him, his eyes are still cast low, but his gaze is intense with something dark, a promise entirely without words: anything that tries to separate Bucky from Sam is going to get put in the ground.

Sam isn’t exactly sure what to do with that level of protectiveness, is even less sure what to do with the fact that the feeling is mutual and he isn’t sure when that happened. Even so, he’s reasonably sure Bucky isn’t going to off him between here and reconvening with Steve. “Barnes has my 6,” he answers and doesn’t think he’s imagining the way Bucky’s expression clears slightly. “We’ll get there, Cap, just take care of yourself.”

“ _Copy_ ,” Steve says over the sound of the shield connecting with something distinctly fleshy.

*

For as easy as it was—easy being relative and all—for Sam to accept Bucky’s presence while under fire, it’s a little hard to walk right into acknowledging that he’s bringing back the love of Steve’s life. Knowing it ahead of time isn’t even really enough to prepare him for the look on Steve’s face when they manage to make the trek out to their vehicle. His eyes pass over Sam, checking for injuries like he always does, but the pinched look on his face, the way he smells like a horror show of heartbreak and relief is new. He’s so in love it hurts and neither of them really know what that means. None of them, Sam thinks as he looks over at Bucky, know exactly what they’re even dealing with.

The tension Bucky has been carrying doesn’t loosen in the slightest, but his scent washes through with relief as soon as Steve is in view.

“Heya Buck,” Steve shifts forward, only catching himself at the last second when Bucky flinches. Chastened, Steve stays where he is, keeps his hands low and open. “You’re ok, I don’t want to hurt you,” he says gently. “Do you know who I am?”

Bucky still nods like he’s not sure he’s allowed to move, won’t quite look Steve in the eyes. “Steve,” he answers roughly, almost like a cough, and it’s still just about enough to send Steve to pieces.

“And just like that, we’re supposed to be cool?” Sam asks, trying to be fair about this, but _really, Steve?_

Steve shoots him a look, filled with the exact combination of exasperated and desperate that makes Sam know this is a losing fight. This was always their best-case scenario; this is the reunion they’d been working towards this whole time. He’s not trying to shit on it, but somebody has to be firing on all cylinders and Sam is the only one not tragically in love… Or, okay, that’s not entirely true, but…

Sam rubs a hand down his face. He doesn’t want to rain on their parade, but _someone_ has to think this shit through and it’s not exactly his strong suit either.

A low rumbling explosion from the warehouse shakes the ground under their feet even from this far out. Sam lets himself stay in battle mode for the time being. Sometimes they stay to coordinate with law enforcement, but with a fugitive who’s looking more unsteady by the second, they need to bail before someone starts searching the surrounding area.

“We need to get out of here before the feds show up,” Sam states the obvious, because baby steps will get you there eventually. “The motel should be safe until we can change cars and… get the hell out of dodge.”

“There’s a safe-house a few hours upstate,” Steve suggests. “S.H.I.E.L.D. never used it, so they shouldn’t know to look for us there.”

Sam almost asks why Steve knows about it, but Natasha had also given him a list of places he wasn’t meant to share either. He’s not thrilled about the idea of getting in an enclosed space with all their emotions boiling so close to the surface, but—

Bucky moves his gun and for a second Sam’s heart jumps up in his throat and he’s reaching for his own. Then he realizes Bucky is handing the rifle to him, stock first. He still won’t look at him, but there’s a grim understanding on his face. Sam doesn’t make a whole event of taking the gun, finding the safety already on. “Thanks,” he offers and Bucky nods, taking a casual parade rest.

Awaiting instructions, Steve and Sam seem to realize at the same time.

“The back is tinted,” Sam says and Steve nods, digging in his pockets for the keys.

“Sit—” Steve stops like he’s swallowed his tongue. Giving orders like that has never sat well with him either, especially not when Bucky won’t say no. “Can you take the back, Bucky?”

The phrasing isn’t a whole lot better, but it strokes easier over all their nerves when Bucky nods, getting in the back seat with little fuss. Steve gives Sam one helplessly open look before he takes a breath and gets into the driver’s seat.

Sam has been in the passenger seat for a grand total of three seconds and he already desperately wants to let down the window. Hell, between Bucky radiating stress and Steve trying to be subtle about the way he’s reflexively scenting the air and flashing bright with disbelief every time he does, it’s already a lot. But with Bucky also sweating chemicals like a tweaker coming down, Sam is tempted to tuck and roll. By the time they get back to the motel, Sam is already fighting off a mild headache before he even sees the unmarked cop cars in the parking lot.

Bucky tenses in the back like an alarm just before Sam leans back in his seat and says, “Nice welcome they sent us.” Not for the first time, Sam’s glad they travel light, even if he is a little annoyed to leave behind his fresh clothes.

“Yeah,” Steve says, continuing onward carefully angling his face towards Sam as he mutters, “I love surprise parties.”

Sam glances in the rearview as Bucky twists to watch the motel roll past. “We may need that back up sooner than later, Steve,” he sighs.

“Tony?” Steve offers first. Sam is tired enough that the dry look he shoots Steve probably has more exasperation than it normally would, but it works to bring him back to the reality in which they’ve got _The Winter Soldier_ in their back seat. “Nat?”

“If she’s stateside, she’s our best bet,” Sam agrees, going for his latest burner phone. He memorizes Natasha’s number every time she gets a new semi-permanent line, but he always has a moment of tense doubt even though he knows she never responds immediately.

By the time she has texted him back—nothing more than a confirmation of receipt—the sun has started to rise and they’re about to run out of gas. Bucky hasn’t spoken another word since they got in the car, even at Steve’s gentle prompting about the temperature and the radio or if he’s hungry, like this is a normal road trip and Sam isn’t constantly checking to make sure they don’t have a tail. Bucky’s sitting like he’s being restrained by more than just a seatbelt, eyes catching on every flicker of movement outside the car in a way that’s making Sam tired just to watch. The bags under Bucky’s eyes are thrown into sharp relief by the shadows of the sunrise.

“We should have enough to fill up the tank,” Steve says, turning into the driveway of the tiniest truck stop Sam has ever seen in his life. At least it doesn’t look like it has security cameras from this decade. “If we do it now, we can get close enough to ditch the car before we hoof it to the safehouse.”

“Sure,” Sam says, digging in Steve’s pocket for the cash. “Stay with the car,” he says, because bossing Steve around doesn’t work unless he agrees to it, so Sam never hesitates to give it a shot. There’s a protest right on the tip of Steve’s tongue, but it dies when Sam puts a baseball cap on Steve’s head before pulling on his own sunshades. “Don’t want your fanboys to be able to say they saw you.”

There has never been a moment in his life that he has not been distinctly aware of his surroundings and his status. He tries to thread the needle between walking like he’s military and not giving away that he’s armed, but ultimately it doesn’t seem like too much of an issue. There’s almost nobody around except the man riffling through the outdoor cooler and a clerk who looks more interested in restocking the cigs than speaking to him.

“Hey man, put that on number 2, would you?” Sam says sorting out their cash, looking over the counter at the little selection of food. “And, uh, all those sandwiches, actually?”

The cashier visibly pauses at that, before he turns around to squint through the plexiglass. “All of them?”

Sam shrugs. “It’s been a long trip,” and damn if that ain’t true.

It’s not until he’s coming back out that trouble glances his way in the form of the noble day-drinker he’d seen half in the freezer on his way in. He smells like booze and Alpha and Sam doesn’t like to stereotype, but those scents are not exactly associated with pleasant memories.

“How’s it goin’, man?” Sam says a little louder than usual, taking comfort in how quickly Steve’s gaze jerks up from where he’s pumping gas.

The guy sizes him up with his nostrils flared, holding his six pack like a weapon and Sam would _really_ love to not have to do the same with his bag of deli sandwiches. “…You smell like you been causing trouble,” the guy says and Sam feels tension chord up his back.

For all that he thinks about the image he projects, he’s not sure how he forgot that he’s been hotboxed in the car with a distressed omega for the past few hours. “My buddy’s had a rough day,” he replies patiently.

“Yeah? Why don’t you let him tell me that?”

Sam is running thin on patience, actually. “Nah, but thanks for the concern,” he says, trying to give him a wide berth as he sidesteps him.

Of course, Mr. Highway Hero doesn’t take the hint, steps back into Sam’s path. “I’m gonna haveta—” he says and reaches for Sam with the kind of boldness only drunk Alphas ever exhibit.

There was no chance he ever would’ve actually made contact. Sam is too damn good to get caught in a tussle with a septuagenarian in a gas station parking lot. He’s annoyed, not worried, as he neatly steps out of range. At least not until Steve’s alarm streaks through his chest before he even shouts “ _Hey!_ ” over the sound of a car door opening a bit too aggressively.

Sam’s stomach drops and Bucky’s out of the backseat like a shot before Ol’ Dude can even turn around properly. His Coors hit the ground as soon as he sees Bucky—wild-eyed and snarling—quickly eating up the space between them. He smells like he’s about to faint. If Sam didn’t know what he was dealing with, he’d probably see his life flash before his eyes, too, but he’s…

An idiot, probably, but he’s going to trust Bucky’s protective instincts to not get him hurt.

“Hey, _hey_ ,” Sam calls, trying to get between Bucky and the guy. He’s _reeking_ of rage, reaches to pull Sam behind him even as Steve gets close enough to form the second half of Sam’s wall.

“Alright, that’s enough,” Steve says and Bucky doesn’t blow past them, but he’s still mad-dogging a cowering civilian, refusing to move even as Steve is carefully trying to get him to back up without touching him. “Come on, you hothead, don’t—”

“ _Stand down_ ,” Sam orders only for Bucky to lock up so mechanically it’s like he’s been put on standby. He winces at the smell of his regret, gentles his voice. “It’s okay, he just thought you were in trouble. Let’s go, it’s okay.”

The acrid scent of the man’s fear is barely noticeable under the whirlwind of Bucky’s emotions, but Sam glances at him long enough to raise his eyebrows in question. The man raises his hands and stumbles back without a word, never once taking his eyes off Bucky. In the early morning light, Sam thinks he might be hard pressed to realize he was even standing near Captain America, but there’s no reason to try their luck today. The clerk is looking out the door, but nobody else seems to have noticed this little incident.

Steve apparently feels the same, giving Sam a quick once over before glancing around and nodding Bucky back towards the car. “Let’s go.”

Taking the rest of the thirty seconds to let the tank finish filling up has Sam’s teeth on edge as he scans the road for cruisers, but none show. It seems like the man very much went back inside to shit himself, not call the cops. Steve still pulls out of the parking lot a little faster than is probably legally justifiable, but Sam doesn’t comment on it.

“So,” he starts instead, glancing at Bucky where he’s practically buzzing in the back seat. He waves a sandwich at him, waits for him to blink his eyes back into focus, surprised, before he takes it. Sam unwraps the roasted turkey for Steve. “So, is this house far enough off the grid that an American icon, a semi-feral omega, and their roguishly handsome friend won’t attract too much attention?” he asks, smothering a tired smirk when Steve shoots him a dry look. “Well?”

“It’s out of the way and not under our names,” Steve answers, taking the sandwich.

“That’s a start,” Sam allows, before tucking into a truly bland chicken salad.

The house is the same sort of bland, nondescript little thing he would expect to be this far out past the suburbs. It’s a little dusty when they open the door, like nobody’s been in it since it was set up. Steve and Sam still go in—shield and gun first—to make sure of that, Bucky at their back as they sweep the house. It’s clean, of bugs that listen and bugs that crawl, and they don’t find any evidence that anyone intends to come back.

If there’s a plan past this, Sam isn’t clear on his part in it. Bucky clearly isn’t either, looks even more wildly out of place than they do. He’s as stiff as a piece of furniture in the middle of the room, tracking their movements by watching their chests, from the looks of it. It’s still grating on Sam’s nerves that he won’t look them in the eyes, but he can only imagine—and God, does he not want to—what was done to train him into this from the cheeky omega Steve used to tell stories about.

Steve lets out a sigh that Sam has come to learn means he doesn’t really know what he’s doing, but things are calm enough that he’s had time to put thought into faking it. “We can lay low here,” he says and Sam has to respect him for not trying to stick some arbitrary timeframe on that statement.

“At least until we have a better plan?” Sam finishes, because today has been a lot and, even without the influence of Bucky’s hormones being all out of whack, he does sort of want to go to ground. He returns the faint smirk Steve shoots him before they both look at Bucky, who tenses under the attention.

“ _Don’t_ , Bucky, you’re safe now,” Steve says gently, with the level of confidence Sam would expect only of someone who’s never been hurt before. There’s barely a moment’s hesitation when he raises his hand before he squeezes Bucky’s shoulder.

The gesture is blatantly much more welcome this time. Bucky visibly goes weak in the knees, swaying towards Steve like his touch is all he’s been waiting for in all their years apart. His scent starts swirling with relief and what can only be _love_ so thoroughly that Sam feels something lodge in his throat even before Steve’s eyes well up.

It’s clear as day that this, that _Bucky,_ is everything Steve has been missing.

Abruptly, a supply run sounds like a great idea. He turns away when Steve looks up at him, hoping the way his heart wrenches in his chest isn’t as transparent as it feels. “Cool. Yeah. If—if everything is under control for the moment,” he rubs a hand over the back of his head, “I think there’s enough gas for me to go—”

“ _No_.”

They both freeze up at the sound of Bucky’s voice, but can’t help but visibly wince when Bucky’s knees thump solidly against the floor.

Bucky’s got his throat bared and wrists turned out in a display of submission that sets Sam’s hair on end. The scent of his terror is bitter in the back of Sam’s throat.

“Buck—” Steve starts, stricken, only to stop when Sam comes forward to drop down as well, into a squat that’s a little kinder on his knees.

It shocks Bucky into looking at him, but Sam has never allowed himself to stand over anyone who’s cowering. Not even the brainwashed assassin his partner is in love with. “Look, man, I’m gonna be real with you here, okay?” he admits, hands splayed out passively. “I don’t know what you need, but—”

“Stay,” Bucky rasps. The third word he’s spoken and it sounds like he’s begging. Sam’s heart is breaking.

“Okay,” he says before he can think better of it. In spite of everything, there’s still something in him as an Alpha that will not abandon an omega that needs him. The disbelief in Bucky’s eyes makes it worth it almost immediately, even if Sam shrugs under the weight of his gaze. “Not like I got anywhere else to be.”

Sam looks up at Steve and can see the sort-of-not-untruth prickle at him, but whatever he’s feeling is lost under everything else that’s happened today. They all need a fucking shower, frankly, and Bucky could use a nap or three. Even kneeling in front of Sam, he looks dangerously close to slumping to the floor.

Sam had noticed the stiff way Bucky was carrying himself earlier, but any number of unpleasant surprises could be causing that. He’s sweating a little, too, damp all across his forehead; the distress on him drying stale and welling up fresh all at once.

“Barnes—” Sam stops at the barely noticeable tightening around Bucky’s eyes. “Bucky,” he corrects. “Are you injured? At all?” He smells faintly of blood, but he’s so heavily medicated, it’s honestly a little hard to tell if it’s his.

Steve’s nostrils flare slightly and Sam wonders if even he can still pick out the minutiae of Bucky’s scent. If the heavy coating of drugs and stress is even more offensive to someone who knows what Bucky is supposed to smell like.

There’s a breath of hesitation before Bucky shakes his head that makes Sam narrow his eyes, but he holds his tongue. He doesn’t feel comfortable asking a strip search of someone who probably wouldn’t feel safe saying no.

“The arm?” Steve asks like it pains him to mention. They’d found some files along the way, but they’d been decades old and redacted to hell and back. The remaining bits didn’t paint a pretty picture, so they’re just going to have to take Bucky’s lead on this one.

So to speak, anyway. Bucky doesn’t answer, just starts a series of what Sam recognizes as range of motion exercises. Throughout, his face doesn’t so much as a twitch. That doesn’t really answer the question, given that Bucky’s pain tolerance has probably been skewed off the charts, but it’s the best they’re going to get for now.

Steve looks a little fractured when Sam looks up at him.

That break is probably going to get worse before it gets better.


	3. Chapter 3

The arm is functional.

Bucky is able to demonstrate that without using up any of this day’s patience, regardless of how there seems to be more in supply.

Even lacking the vast majority of the memories of his Alpha, Bucky still recognizes the feeling of being near him. Everything in Bucky recognizes his Alpha, recognizes _Steve_ as warmth and safety, something none of his handlers have ever managed to inspire. He wants to protect him more than he’s ever wanted to do anything for the Alphas Hydra assigned to him. That doesn’t feel like something he was forced to learn, it feels like something that’s always been, something he’d forgotten.

Memories of Alpha Sam are newer, haven’t been shredded by The Chair. He shies away from the thought, the same way he always does, but honestly, his current reality is just as disorienting if much less painful. Alpha Sam doesn’t have the cold smell of amusement that oozed off other Alphas when they were being nice to him just to abuse him moments later. Sam smells wary and maybe a little sad, but nothing about him pings like a threat. Even when Bucky had first found him pinned down in the lab, for all his caution, he hadn’t once treated Bucky like the enemy.

It is the oddest behavior Bucky has ever encountered in an Alpha.

“Well, might as well take it a step at a time. We smell like shit,” Sam says as he stands and, for some reason, offers Bucky his hand on the way up.

Bucky sags with relief a moment before his chest clenches up on reflex.

There are very few reasons he’s ever been rewarded with touch outside of the _perfect_ completion of a mission. Given that he hasn’t received a mission to be rewarded for, he doesn’t understand why Sam could possibly be willing to touch him. This has to be a test. They did that before; offered touch before punishing him for thinking he deserved it, for touching the wrong Alpha, for being desperate enough to take pleasure from any Alpha. Offers like this have never been anything other than a trap.

Hydra didn’t dose him up because they wanted him to feel good, they dosed him up so he’d be compliant.

Alpha Sam doesn’t look deceitful, though, even to Bucky who is trying to think around how loudly his whole body is begging him to just accept the touch.

“Getting showered and fed works for me,” Alpha Steve agrees Bucky doesn’t sense any anger off of him, no possessive rush of jealousy. He even nods encouragingly. “Can we do that, Buck?”

Bucky doesn’t understand what’s wanted of him, really, but Alpha Sam is just waiting patiently, expectantly, so Bucky reaches for his hand. It is not snatched away.

It is warm and steady and Bucky feels relief radiating out from his core, so much it almost makes him queasy. Some of that must be noticeable in his scent because Alpha Sam’s expression twists like he’s hurt. Still, he doesn’t let go, pulls Bucky up off his knees as he internally adjusts his own mission parameters. Clean and fed, that’s what they want to be. Bucky can help them do that.

Bucky remembers standing in the doorway to safehouses for hours on end while his handlers rested and laughed together, never once thinking to step out of line. He guarded them because they commanded it. He’ll guard Sam and Steve because they deserve nothing less.

Neither of them moves, though, when he posts up by the front door. They’re confused, he realizes, as he sees the way they glance at each other, so he nods them on down the hall. He will not let them get caught low.

There’s something unpleasant in the twist of Alpha Steve’s mouth, but before Bucky can feel any dread about it, Alpha Sam bumps their shoulders together. “Go on,” he says, before taking a seat at the kitchen chair closest to the door. They have a conversation that’s all in the eyes even as Alpha Sam continues, “We’ll keep watch for a bit.”

Bucky takes that to mean… well, he’d say Alpha Sam is going to supervise him, but Alpha Sam wouldn’t hold up in a fight against him, not really. Alpha Steve had struggled even with the serum. Sam is either trusting he can get to a gun faster than Bucky can get to him—incorrect—or trusting that Bucky doesn’t mean to hurt him which is absolutely true, but… The idea of being trusted like that is unnervingly unfamiliar to Bucky.

“I—okay,” Alpha Steve says stiltedly, before visibly bolstering himself. “I’ll just be a few,” he promises as he backs towards the hall like he’s waiting for disagreement. When they give him none, he turns to the bathroom.

The way Alpha Sam looks Bucky over is not really subtle, but it doesn’t feel particularly predatory. Even with his eyes averted, he can tell Sam is taking stock of the weapons he still has on him—any of which he would hand over if prompted. He’d hate it, but if it’d make Alpha Sam less uncomfortable, he’d do it. Alphas never touch him unless he’s unarmed and—he doesn’t allow himself to shift his stance, knows it wouldn’t do any good—he wants to be touched more than he wants to be safe.

Safe is not something Bucky has often felt anyway.

“I feel like we should probably have a proper introduction,” Sam says after he completes his count without confiscating anything. “Sam Wilson.”

Bucky nods, throat working. Even now, it’s something of a struggle to get his voice to cooperate with him. “Alpha,” he manages to greet softly, alarmed when Alpha Sam frowns.

“Just Sam,” he corrects gently, uncomfortable but not angry. “Never been big on titles, I like my name just fine.”

That still gives him the unsettled feeling that he’s being tricked, but he doesn’t want to disobey even an indirect order. “Sam,” he says, relaxing by a fraction when Sam nods.

“Right. So, look…” Sam looks at him seriously, mouth a flat line. “My bar for friendship is pretty low these days, okay?” He twirls his hand towards Bucky. “You’re not here to off us, right? Spy on us, kidnap us, nothing like that?”

Bucky shakes his head instantly for each suggestion. For everything he may be confused about, he isn’t questioning where his loyalties lie. The only life he has going forward is the one Steve sets in order for him.

“Then we’re on the same page,” Sam sighs, less uncomfortable but still not quite relaxed. “I don’t want a fight, and not because I’d get my ass kicked six ways to Sunday,” he says pointing at Bucky who finds, for the first time in decades he’s amused by something. “I just don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

Before Bucky can think better of it, he’s looking right at Sam. It’s disrespectful, he knows, but he needs him to see that he absolutely, desperately doesn’t want either of them to get hurt. The idea that Sam might grant him that, too, seems like a dream, but frankly, Bucky is already feeling a little out of his own body. He nods, but his gaze turns at the sound of the bathroom door opening.

As promised, Alpha— _Steve’s_ shower takes no more than a few minutes and he’s back out and dressed. Sam stands with little more than a glance down his body, same as Bucky, instinctually checking for any injuries that might be showing in short sleeves, a thinner shirt.

“You two should…” Sam starts, then visibly reconsiders his words. “Steve, you should talk,” he settles on, starting down the hall. Bucky can’t help but notice Steve catch himself in an aborted motion to lean into Sam, his gaze falling back on Bucky.

It leaves Bucky floating again, lost in the jungle of strings in his head that were dangling lose for years, now tying themselves back to Steve.


	4. Chapter 4

It’s been a very long time since Steve has thought about himself as being _too much_.

One of the upsides to dating Sam has been knowing he can push, and push _pretty damn hard_ , and Sam will meet him there good-humoredly or shove him back in line. They have fun, growling and nipping at each other, not having to hold back just because he’s an Alpha and he’s got to _play gentle with omegas, Steven_. There are mornings where Steve wakes up and just lays on Sam, laughs at his grumbling as he scents him before they go about their days. If they’re separated—by missions or meetings or whatever—Steve knows he can expect to get pushed into the nearest bit of privacy and reminded with teeth whose side he belongs against. He takes it knowing he can dish out the same and it will not be too much, not for Sam.

Bucky used to rise to that fight, too, would gladly muscle around his little Alpha until Steve growled against his throat leaving Bucky shuddering, submitting joyously.

This Bucky, in the present day, doesn’t have a challenging smirk on his face, he doesn’t smell playful and teasing. He smells almost _sick_ , so much like Steve had when his body had been so busy attacking itself the doctors set up a continual string of chemical soldiers in his blood. It’s terrifying, not knowing what the hell Bucky is on, but he’s very clearly at the front end of a nasty detox. He’s hurting and more than a little scared and Steve is itching all over at the smell of it. Bucky is supposed to smell like love, not suffering.

Not touching him for now is the right choice, but it makes Steve feel like there are nails on a chalkboard in the back of his mind.

“Steve?” Bucky verbally nudges and, for as rough as it is, it’s still got a shadow of something familiar to it. The memory of a guileless smirk, _Stevie, I can hear you thinking all the way over here, penny for your thoughts? Hell, have a whole dollar._

Steve swallows. It doesn’t seem fair to ask how much he remembers, given that he hadn’t remembered Steve at all a few months ago. He goes riffling through the linen closet just to give his hands something to do. “What do you know about me?” he says, waffling on saying ‘ _us’_ at the last second.

For a few too many heartbeats, he just feels Bucky staring at him. Maybe he’s trying to figure out what he knows or what answer Steve wants, but eventually he says, “Your mom’s name was Sarah,” and Steve’s throat goes tight. He turns and Bucky continues, “You used to wear newspapers in your shoes. You…” He looks Steve up his whole body, brow quirking and Steve wonders if Bucky can already smell the love clogging his throat. “You were smaller.”

Steve actually finds himself laughing a little at that as he pulls some spare clothes out. “Yeah, I’m a little bigger now,” he smiles and gets a hesitant one in return. The smile dims some as he hands Bucky the clothes. “A lot has changed since then.”

Since Steve was small enough for Bucky to pick up, laughing at his snarling, only to minutes later happily pretend to lose the fight. Since he was big enough, _Alpha enough_ to rescue his omega only to fail and lose him again and…

“Stevie,” Bucky says, and this time it sounds heavy, like he wants Steve to catch it.

Steve hurts for him. He catches him by the shoulder in a reflex as old as their friendship. “Yeah, Buck,” he says, heart in his throat when Bucky staggers on his feet. He brings his other hand up to steady him. The smell of Bucky’s relief is nearly overwhelming when he tips forward to rest his forehead against Steve’s shoulder. “Woah, easy, I got you, pal.”

It’s not a hug, not in as many words. Bucky’s arms stay dangling at his sides even while Steve rubs between his shoulder blades. He shudders silently, radiating a weirdly discordant peace, but not so much as twitching away from Steve’s touch. So, Steve stands there silently, too, trying to pick out the pieces of Bucky’s scent he recognizes under all of his suffering.

When the bathroom door opens, Bucky starts like he’s been woken up suddenly. It’s a half-guilty motion and immediately leaves him standing at attention again as Sam comes down the hall. It’s better than kneeling, at least, so Steve bites his tongue.

Sam glances at Bucky’s hands where he’s clutching Steve’s spare clothes like Sam might be inclined to take them from him. Of course, Sam does no such thing. “Shower’s all yours.”

Bucky gives him a polite nod, starting towards the bathroom.

Sam pauses a few steps past him, turning around. “Hey man,” he calls, Bucky looking back to him instantly. “If you need help, you just gotta ask us.” He nods at the shower, “Don’t pass out in there trying to be a tough guy, that’s Steve’s schtick.”

There’s something that may be a ghost of humor on Bucky’s face at that, like maybe he remembers that to be true and is just as annoyed by it now as he was then. Steve lets his mouth pull to the side, annoyed in a way that he knows doesn’t actually reach his eyes. There’s another flash of warmth in Bucky’s expression, but he just nods, continuing down the hall.

In the silence he leaves behind, Sam grabs his phone looking like he means to launch straight into logistics, bypassing the conversation boiling in Steve’s chest. Steve is willing to let him do that, won’t force it given how damn weird this all is. If Sam asks him, he’ll leave the trace of pain in Sam’s scent alone. But Sam has barely glanced at the screen before he puts his phone face down on the table with a near silent sigh, pressing his hands flat. Never one to cower, he looks Steve in the eyes. He looks resigned. “Well?”

“I love you,” Steve blurts out immediately and Sam’s expression doesn’t change, but Steve feels his dread as clear as if it’d happened in his own stomach.

Sam swallows. “But?” he demands softly.

“But _nothing_ , I just—I…” Steve takes a breath to steady himself. “I don’t know what I’m doing here, Sam,” he confesses, because at the very least, Sam is owed honesty. “I _have_ to look out for Bucky, but I have no clue what that’s going to look like. Even if I did, I have no right to ask you to have anything to do with it, with _us_ —”

“Steve, you’re _Mine_ ,” Sam says and the words jolt through Steve’s entire body.

Had anyone else pulled a stunt like that, Steve might’ve cold cocked them. There are very few ‘traditional’ things about him as an Alpha, but being claimed is not something he has ever allowed. _Mine_ is a title given to omegas, to someone whose soul is too tied up in an Alpha’s to be solely their own.

Sam saying it just makes Steve want to go to his knees and say _yes_.

There’s a moment where Sam’s face flickers like he realizes the implications of his words, of what exactly he’s asking of Steve a second too late and far too honestly to take back. Terror is not a familiar look on Sam’s face, but it fades when Steve fills to the brim with love and pleasure, so much so that tears rise to his eyes.

Sam lets out a heavy breath, coming close to cup Steve’s jaw. “You’re Mine,” he repeats, this time less gut instinct and more quiet confidence. “And seems like as far as Bucky is concerned, that means I get a two-for one special on super soldiers. That’s alright by me.”

Steve laughs a little at that, bowing into Sam’s hand. “Hell of a deal.”

“Yeah, it is,” Sam smiles finally, looking so fond Steve’s heart clenches, but he lets it drop after a moment. “If you said you had to do this on your own, I’d let you.” He doesn’t say that it would tear his heart out, but Steve can read that in his eyes. “I’d say you were an _idiot_ , but I knew that going in, so…”

Tears roll down Steve’s cheek when he rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah…”

“So, I love you, too,” Sam concludes, taking Steve’s face in both hands now, wiping his tears. “And unless you’re kicking me out, I’m in this for the long haul.”

_With you ‘til the end of the line._

Steve’s type is people who are just as committed to him as he is to them. He’s never letting either of them go, not as long as he’s got fight in him. He wraps Sam up and kisses him, because there’s no way he possibly couldn’t when his senses are alight with Sam’s love. Sam laughs when Steve ducks to stick his face into Sam’s throat, takes a breath of him that warms him all over and makes the ground feel steadier under his feet. “I can’t ever thank you enough, Alpha,” he whispers, sighing delightedly when Sam squeezes him tighter.

“Don’t mention it. Wouldn’t you do it for me?” Sam asks and doesn’t even wait for the answer, because they both know Steve would do just about anything for him. “We’ll figure this out, Steve, we always do.”

Steve hears the shower shut off and keeps an ear out for any indication Bucky may need help. He just hears him stepping into his clothes and steals another quick kiss from Sam. He doesn’t know if Bucky can tell they’re involved—even though he’s been told it’s glaringly obvious—but he won’t lay it all out until Bucky is present enough to have a full conversation about it.

It settles something in the core of Steve to have provided even his borrowed clothes for Bucky, but he tries not to glow too obviously about it.

Steve gets the impression he’s not quite as successful as he hoped when Sam rolls his eyes, but the expression on his face is fond and easy, so he’ll take the ribbing.


	5. Chapter 5

Whatever tentative peace they were able to find freshly showered starts peeling off when it starts raining as Steve is prying open some food for dinner.

Something about the storm has gotten Bucky agitated.

Still as silent as ever, but Sam watches as he paces the rooms, checking the doors and windows, again and again. He barely lets either of them get more than two seconds out of his sight, continually readjusting to Steve’s movement through the tiny kitchen so he can watch him and Sam and the door all at once.

“Buck…” Steve calls out and he stops his circuit instantly, something unnervingly hopeful on his face. “Is there something specific we should be worried about?”

Bucky shakes his head, but he still smells like his stress levels have escalated since he got here instead of the other way around. Sam didn’t exactly expect him to come around right away, didn’t expect anything close to normalcy in the near future, but something about this seems off. Bucky seems like he’s fighting something and Sam is getting to the point of genuinely hoping it’s not some sleeper cell activation that will kick in and get them killed. Stranger things have happened.

Steve meets Sam’s gaze for a moment, confirming their mutual concern. “Then how about you sit down,” Steve offers hesitantly, nodding at the table where Sam is seated. “If you burn through everything like I do, I know you’re hungry.”

Even in the face of what he would take as an order regardless of Steve attempting to be gentle, Bucky hesitates to approach the table. He maybe even looks a little pale when Sam pulls out a chair for him. “The food isn’t that bad, I promise,” he tries to joke. “Canned soup is a little better than MREs these days.”

The joke doesn’t land, but Bucky manages to unlock at the sound of his voice. He sits down stiffly at the table, mechanically accepting a bowl from Steve. He doesn’t move to even take his spoon, hands resting on his knees until Steve hands Sam a bowl, too. The mealtime politeness—Alphas first, omegas optional—is something that has always grated on Steve’s nerves, but Sam always tries to get around it by shoving a bite into his mouth almost as soon as he sits down. Steve’s shoulders untense when Bucky takes that as the permission it is and starts to eat.

“We have a friend who’s working on getting us some help,” Steve says as Bucky starts eating his soup. “At least transport back to New York so we can hunker down until we work out…” He gestures with his spoon.

“How to get you back on the list of the living,” Sam offers, “without dragging any legal issues behind us.” Any _more_ legal issues anyway.

Bucky nods stiffly, but doesn’t look all that reassured.

Steve knocks on the table by his hand. “Look, you’re not going back into the fight or—or to Hydra, I’m—we’re…” He cuts a look at Sam who can’t help but ache for him, just a little. Alpha instincts are different for everyone, but they’re hard to ignore. “We’re going to take care of you.”

It should maybe come across as condescending, _presumptuous_ even, but Bucky has spent all of his early memories, to the best of Sam’s understanding, knowing exactly how far Steve would go for a stranger, let alone someone he loves. There’s no telling exactly which Bucky sees him as, whether or not he’s able to trust that as completely true, but he takes it for what it is. He nods his understanding, gives a tiny smile; stressed, but still relieved. Something is _off_.

The stress pouring off Steve probably isn’t helping matters, but it just solidifies Sam’s idea that even Steve—who’s probably reeling from exactly how much is wrong with this new version of Bucky—is picking up on something extra.

Sam does a better job of pretending not to stare, but he still can’t help but notice how intensely Bucky is focused on eating his food. He isn’t scarfing it exactly, but shoveling in huge bites that are just shy of stuffing his face. It’s between bites, that a look crosses his face that’s almost like he’s spacing out, but Sam is a counselor for a living. The flicker of his eyes is familiar; he’s sat across from that look more often than the average person.

“Bucky, when was the last time you slept?” Sam asks, stomach a little tight.

Bucky responds by sitting up straighter in his chair, pulling his expression together when he looks over at Sam. Even done in desperation, it’s still the most effective attempt at ‘ _I wasn’t just sleeping with my eyes open_ ’ as a facial expression Sam has ever seen. He looks like he’s pulled a completely blank and complacent slate over his face.

“Buck,” Steve breathes out, wounded. “Are you _tired_?”

The question puts a bit of pallor in Bucky’s face. He gives a minute shake of his head that doesn’t look even remotely honest.

Sam’s heart hurts to think he probably hasn’t felt safe enough to sleep until his body made the choice for him until now. For all that he doesn’t like the idea of giving orders to someone who won’t turn them down, he also isn’t going to stand around while Bucky tortures himself, unintentionally or not. That’s a line inside himself he’s willing to cede. “Bucky, after we eat, Steve and I are going to take first watch,” he says. “You can take the bed or the couch, whichever feels most comfortable. We’ll wake you when we need you up, clear?”

The sour, achey smell Bucky is carrying doesn’t leave, but the tension in his shoulders gives way gratefully. He gives Steve a glance, even as he nods sharply at Sam’s words.

“We got this, Buck,” Steve promises. “Finish up and get some shut eye, okay?”

Bucky gives another tiny tilt of his head. He still eats a little slowly, stiltedly, but he finishes his bowl. Sam has to prod Steve to do the same. He just smiles slightly, giving an encouraging nod towards the main room. Sam watches carefully as Bucky stands, tense with lessons learned the hard way, but he gets the feeling it would take so much more than sleep deprivation to bring Bucky to his knees.

Still, they both watch Bucky slowly lower himself onto the couch like the simple act of resting is foreign. He shoots them another hesitant glance, like maybe he still expects new orders, but when Sam just nods at him, he finally lays down.

Steve looks content to watch him nap the whole time, but his eyes fall to the table where Sam’s phone is lighting up. As much as Steve probably doesn’t want to let Bucky out of his sight, he wants to disturb his rest even less. Sam knows intimately how easy it is to wake up a super soldier. They barely have to glance at each other, moving at once to the front door. They open it to the cool, muggy air of an evening storm, closing the door gently behind them. Sam watches with a wave of sympathy as Steve sits down on the top step of the stoop, the tiny overhang barely keeping him out of the misting rain.

Some of the steel seeps out of his spine when Sam joins him, sitting close enough that their thighs are pressed together. He texts Natasha that they’re safe to answer and her call rings through a second later. “Romanov,” he greets softly.

“ _Wilson_ , _Cap,_ ” Natasha replies, sounding like she’s in the back of a suspiciously empty bus. Sam doesn’t bother asking. “ _So,_ _you got The Soldier._ ”

“We have _Bucky_ ,” Steve corrects.

“ _How sure are you about that?_ ” Natasha asks flatly.

“His programming fell apart when they couldn’t get him back in The Chair,” Sam answers when Steve’s lips just thin out, scent spiking with offense. “Biggest problem we’re about to have is withdrawal,” he continues, shrugging at Steve’s startled face. “They had him on…” He rubs at his nose reflexively, thinking of the bitter chemical tinge following Bucky around. “A lot of shit, Nat.”

“ _Anything you recognized?_ ”

Sam hums. “A few different barbiturates. Some kind of heat inhibitor, too, but I think it’s cut with something? Everything is too mixed up. Should we be anticipating something specific?”

The way Natasha pauses feels a lot less like she doesn’t know the answer and more like she doesn’t want to say.

“Nat?” Steve prompts.

“ _Sounds like the base of one of Hydra’s special cocktails,_ ” she responds. “ _They had a number of mixes meant to…inspire loyalty,_ ” she answers carefully.

“Meaning what?” Steve presses.

“ _It’s a backup to the conditioning from the mindwipes. If it’s what I’m thinking, it made him dependent on his handler’s touch._ ”

Sam digs his heel into Steve’s foot to distract him from getting caught up in the rush of fury suddenly stinging in his scent. The vacant look on Bucky’s face pops into Sam’s head with an entirely different level of horror. “How dependent?”

“ _Enough for him to go running back to Hydra even if he knew exactly what that meant for him_ ,” Natasha answers. It’s not a pretty picture and it hits Steve right in the stomach, has him putting his face in his hands. “ _The drug was meant to simulate a bond that would override any instinct that didn’t send him back to his Alpha—_ ” Steve growls a little at that, but Sam doesn’t call him on it and neither does Natasha. “… _Depending on how long since he dug out the implant, the withdrawal is going to get… rough._ ”

Natasha has described torture as inconvenient; Sam doesn’t know how to wrap his mind around her idea of _rough._ Sam doesn’t have to dig far to pull up the memories of glassy-eyed vets with ruined veins trying to explain why falling off the wagon might not have been the worst decision they ever made even as their lives collapsed around them. Bucky had to break through decades of brainwashing to even get here, Sam can’t imagine what kind of pain it would take to make him leave.

“Well, good thing his Alpha is here, then,” he says, meaning to be encouraging to Steve more than anything else.

It’s at least enough to get Steve to sit up straight again, cutting him a brief, grateful look. “Can we give him anything to help him come down?”

“ _Nothing you can get fast enough,_ ” Natasha answers. “ _It’ll be easier with you helping him, but he’s not going to be in any condition to travel pretty soon._ ”

Given that Bucky’s distress is already strong enough to sink into their clothes, traveling is pretty low on the list of things Sam wants to do at the moment. He doesn’t have to look at Steve to know they’re both willing to let this be the fort they hold down until they can get secure transport. “How far out are you?”

Natasha hums and there’s the sound of metal shrieking before she answers. “ _It’ll be a day or so. There should be enough food to last even you guys,_ ” she answers. “ _The worst of the pain will probably pass around then, but he’ll still be…._ ”

“Swinging between a hair trigger and completely checked out?” Steve finishes wryly for her.

“ _If you’re already having fun with that, he’s probably headed for a crash once it burns off entirely,_ ” Natasha answers. “ _You must have a hell of a magnetic personality, Cap._ ”

Steve lets out a soft laugh, but it’s tired and humorless. “Yeah, I get that a lot. We’ll stay put until we hear from you.”

“ _Understood. Keep me updated_ ,” Natasha replies and then the line disconnects.

Sam lets the quiet left in her wake rest for a moment. He looks out at the rain, gives his fear and frustration a few seconds to tell him all the ways they aren’t prepared to deal with this before he sighs them out. Prepared or not, they’re doing it. It’s not even a question. He squeezes Steve’s knee, drawing his eyes out of middle distance. “Let’s go in, it’s like breathing soup out here.”

“We should let him rest,” Steve replies, shaking his head.

“You’ve gotta rest, too, Steve. _Hey,_ ” Sam cuts him off as soon as he opens his mouth to protest. “I don’t need two super soldiers strung out on no sleep; I don’t need my _Alpha_ strung out on no sleep.” It’s a dirty trick, but the pride and pleasure—even with the background annoyance of someone who knows they’re being had—in Steve scent is a welcome change from the anger still lingering on him. Sam noses at Steve’s neck, wants to bury himself in that scent. “I didn’t make it in special ops by not being observant, Steve. I’ll stay up if it makes you feel better.”

Steve stays still long enough that Sam thinks he’s going to try and argue with that, but then he turns his face towards Sam, sliding an arm around his back. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

“Oh, make no mistake, you owe me one hell of an anniversary dinner,” Sam says drily leaning his weight into Steve’s side to feel his laughter. “I’m no cheap date.”

“I’d never stiff you,” Steve tells him. But when he sits back, Sam is able to see how tired he is in the way Steve has only allowed this far into their relationship. “We’ll go skydiving. With parachutes even.”

Sam rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t hide his smile. “Come on, go lay down for a while.”

They open the door as gingerly as they can, but apparently didn’t need to bother. Either Bucky recognizes them even asleep or he’s legitimately too tired to notice the door opening. Sam hopes against all hope that it’s the former, because the idea that he’s so tired it overrides all the training he’s ever received is painful. Steve’s movement stalls when he sees Bucky, gone from flat on his back to curled tightly into the back of the sofa. There’s an equal mix of worry and longing on his face, in the air, but he breathes softly when Sam puts a hand on his back. He signals down the hall and Steve nods back silently.

Steve goes to the bedroom—a really generous term, given how it’s mostly storage space—and Sam locks the door. He checks the windows, mostly just so he can tell Bucky it’s been done when he wakes up, and sits back down at the kitchen table. For lack of anything else to do, he bums around on his phone.

It’s only been about three hours when Bucky shifts and Sam’s eyes snap to the sound instantly. He’s been looking him over every so often, because there isn’t much else in the room worth resting his eyes on. For the past few hours, Bucky has been stone still save for his breathing. Sometime between now and the last time Sam looked, though, he’s sweated through his shirt. Even in his sleep, it seems like he’s holding himself a bit too tightly, twitching and tossing his head.

Sam is just starting to consider the safest way to wake him up when he startles himself awake. Except instead of being a violent flurry of motion, it’s Bucky’s whole body tensing so sharply that Sam swears he can hear the creaking of his joints. It’s like an attempt to stay quiet and brace for the result of failing all at once.

“Hey,” Sam calls softly, but it only serves to make Bucky go from frozen to holding his breath. “You’re in a safehouse with me and Steve,” he continues calmly. “The windows and doors are locked; nobody has tripped any of the safety measures. I’ve been awake this whole time. You’re safe. Nobody’s going to hurt you.”

Bucky’s eyes are wide when he sits up and faces toward Sam, entirely unfocused for the several blinks it takes his eyes to cooperate. Then his gaze falls to flicker between Sam’s hands. Sam easily rolls them palms up, only to realize a second later Bucky isn’t looking at them for a threat. He lurches _towards_ the motion, body swaying like he’s been pulled before he catches himself. A flicker of doubt crosses his face and he stays where he is. In pain, thinking maybe that Sam means to make him work it out alone.

Sam means to do no such thing.

“It’s okay,” he says as he crosses the room. He sits down on the floor so he doesn’t loom over Bucky. Holding out his arms, he tries not to flinch as Bucky scrambles over to him. They wind up a trembling tangle of feverish skin and twisted clothes. He doesn’t react to the desperate scenting, even as it puts Bucky’s sweaty face right up against his neck. “There we go, I got you, man.”

It’s bad. He knows it’s bad and if he can help, coming away no worse for the wear than needing a shower, that’s a pretty good trade off. He knows Steve trusts him and he’s not going to snap, not when Bucky’s misery is lessened at the touch of their skin. They aren’t going to fight over him, that’s not what this will ever be about. So, he lets Bucky curl into him, holds him close.

True to form, when Steve comes out at the commotion, he doesn’t look angry. He looks pained. He looks grateful.

Before the guilt can yank Bucky out of Sam’s arms to face _his Alpha,_ Steve has joined them on the floor. His hand is gentle on Bucky’s shoulder blades before sliding up to grip the back of his neck.

It’s like all Bucky’s strings cut loose at the feeling, a low groan rumbling from his throat. Fumbling out an arm, he grabs a handful of Steve’s shirt even as he sags heavier into Sam’s embrace. Sam is just starting to wonder how long he can hold his weight like this, willing to give it the old college try, when Steve uses his grip to move Bucky. He goes easily, like the weight of Steve’s hand is more than he could ever dream of resisting. He winds up curled between them, legs tangled and pressed as close as he can get to both their bodies. Sam gets a hold on his forearm, rubs it like he’s trying to warm him up even though he’s sweating. Steve brushes a kiss to his ear before ducking his head against Bucky’s throat, nosing into his skin.

“We’ve got you,” Steve promises softly and the words have Bucky whimpering, a soft and broken little sound. “You’re gonna be okay, Buck, we got you.”

Sam has never known Steve to be a liar.


	6. Chapter 6

Bucky is snarling at the front door.

It’s an abrupt and unpleasant change from two seconds prior when he’d been relaxing against the front of the couch with one of Steve’s legs resting over his shoulder. Even back when Steve was so small the position would leave him off balance, unable to really relax before his hip started hurting, it’d been one of Bucky’s favorites. Seeing him in it now, only to have it ripped out from under them by a threat has him baring his teeth. Steve hears Sam scramble to his feet through the open door of the bedroom as he picks out the sound of someone approaching from under Bucky’s growling.

Steve’s battle mode only has half a heartbeat to activate before he recognizes the gait—intentionally loud, but entirely familiar—and the spike of adrenaline fizzles down. Natasha didn’t call ahead.

“Bucky, it’s okay—”

Sam swings into the room still fully dressed and now armed, not even a wink of sleep in his eyes when they fall on Steve. He smells stressed which makes Steve’s teeth itch a little, but his gun lowers another inch towards the ground at the look on Steve’s face. “What happened?”

“It’s okay, it’s Nat— _Bucky,_ ” Steve calls over the noise, getting between Bucky and the door. He’d have touched him, too, if Sam hadn’t grabbed him by the shoulder.

Bucky isn’t looking at him, his whole body a coil of violence, crouched and growling. Natasha has stopped moving on the other side of the door, but she hasn’t gone away, the _threat_ hasn’t gone away.

“Bucky, she’s with us, I promise she isn’t here to hurt you,” Steve says, “I’d never let her.”

The agitation in Bucky quiets, but doesn’t leave. His focus remains locked on the door, still tense from his jaw to the floor. He takes a step into Steve’s space, but his eyes dart to Sam when he starts forward.

Sam raises a pacifying hand at him. “Can I open that door without you going nuclear?” he asks. “She’s our ticket out of here, it’d be awesome if we didn’t start off this conversation with a fight.”

Bucky stares at him, obviously distrusting, but not quite of Sam. He’s deadly silent now, even his breathing slowed to almost nothing, mind gone hunter instead of hunted. If Natasha were actually inclined to try anything, Steve is quite positive Bucky being disarmed wouldn’t do a thing to keep her safe even with Steve and Sam running defense.

“It’s okay,” Steve assures him again. “Sam and I aren’t letting anything happen to you, not again.” He reaches out in front of him, but not quite to touch or even stop him, just a request. “She’s helping us get home, nothing more.”

When Bucky manages to drag his eyes away from the door to look at Steve, it’s enough of a concession that Steve’s heart unclenches. He even gets a tiny nod.

Sam clicks the safety back on his gun and makes for the door, muttering, “Y’all and your dramatic entrances…”

Steve almost tells him he’s one to talk, but focuses instead on trying to look as reassuring as possible while Sam subtly scents at the doorjamb before he starts to unbar it. He keeps himself carefully in the doorway like he always does, but Steve still catches sight of Natasha, her hair back to its usual red and peeking out the sides of her hoodie.

The breeze has barely brought her familiar scent to him before his attention is swerving wildly back to Bucky who’s pressed up against the far wall. The pained rumble starting up in his chest as his scent ices over with fear has Steve tensing up for a fight, taking a half step in front of Bucky.

Sam whips around to look at them, eyes wide. “Uh okay, what that _fuck?_ ” he says. “Someone wanna share with the class?”

Natasha gives Bucky a thorough assessment, her scent giving away nothing about whatever she sees. She takes a step forward, but Sam doesn’t move out of the way; it’s unclear who exactly he’s protecting here.

“He shot me,” she answers blandly, carefully unmoved by the way Bucky reeks of terror. “Figure an apology is in order.”

Sam’s hackles raise faster than Steve has ever witnessed, least of all towards her. “Natasha…”

“An apology,” she says pointedly, cutting her eyes at Sam when he doesn’t get out of her way. “Then maybe I forgive him for ruining my bikini body and we can move on.”

Steve gets what she’s implying, but that just means he feels mildly conflicted about his urge to growl at her. Bucky’s done enough groveling for two lifetimes and he’s _Steve’s_ now. They need her help, but only in the sense that it’d be a bitch to try and make it cross country without her resources. Steve is sure they could find a way if they had to.

Before he can sort out if he really wants to cross—or burn—that bridge, motion catches on the corner of his vision. Bucky has sunk to the floor, smooth as he is able to, given the tremors broken out over his body. “ _Buck_ …”

In his heart of hearts, he knows Natasha is not going to hurt Bucky, doesn’t even really want to pull rank over him. They’ve never had to hear in detail exactly how The Red Room fucked up her perception of her own gender, but it’s probably a big part of the reason she’s gotten on so well with Alphas like them. The traditional roles and ideals mean nothing to her.

Yet, here she is looking down at Bucky like _of course_ he’s meant to kneel for her, beg for her forgiveness. Steve wants to say something, but his throat closes up on him when Bucky crawls towards her.

Sam’s face twists, but he lowers his arm and turns his gaze out over Natasha’s shoulder as she steps inside for him to close the door. She doesn’t move any closer than it takes to get out of the way of the door, waits for Bucky to make his way across the room on his hands and knees. By now, something numb has come over him. The terror is gone from his face, but he looks almost as sick and drawn as he did when they first came here. He keeps his face lowered as he sits back on his heels, the smell of his terror gone vacant and empty with acceptance.

Natasha hums. “You shot me.”

Bucky looks uncertain even of that, but it wasn’t a question. He doesn’t move.

When he stays silent, Natasha puts her finger, nail first, against his forehead. He goes easily when she pushes his face up, even if his gaze stays averted. “Do you plan on doing it again?” Her nail digs in slightly when he shakes his head, but she moves with him. “Look at me,” she demands and leans down into his face when he complies. “Steve and Sam mean a lot to me. Do you plan on hurting them?” He shakes his head sharply this time, but she removes her finger before he can scratch himself.

For a few heart beats, Natasha just looks at him, makes him hold eye contact longer than either of them has pushed to this point. It doesn’t make him any more or less tense than before, but he stays still, lets himself be scrutinized. He winces nearly invisibly when she reaches forward again, this time to rub gently at his forehead before sliding her fingers back into his hair.

“Okay. Then we’re square now, Barnes.” Natasha says, stroking his hair as he stares at her wild-eyed and heartbreakingly confused. “Forgive and forget.”

Bucky keeps his eyes on her, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but Natasha just keeps petting his hair and breathing slowly.

Steve holds still, nearly holds his breath as he watches her wait with Bucky, wait for him to understand she’s not lying to him. He watches as she rubs the tension out of Bucky’s body with her hand moving through his hair, watches his breathing slow to match hers.

It’s less of a surprise than it should be, really, when Bucky tears up. He flinches, minutely, when she drops to a squat her hand coming down to his cheek, but it just rests there. She watches placidly, tells him softly, “We will not be made to hurt again.”

All of his tears aren’t for her, even as they spill over into her hand, but she catches them anyway. She doesn’t shush him when his breath slides out of rhythm, not quite sobbing, but something so close Steve tears up in sympathy. Natasha doesn’t even force him to move again, just lowers herself onto the floor in front of him. Bucky visibly flounders when she’s suddenly lower than him, but doesn’t resist her when she gently urges him forward until he’s half collapsed over her. He’s not so forward as to stick his face in her throat, but he does rest against her collar bone, shuddering.

Natasha meets Steve’s eyes over his shoulder and something about the vague uncertainty in her expression unfreezes him. Natasha is newer at this, at being around Bucky as a person, as an omega, but she’s not new to pissing off Alphas and resigning herself to the handle results. Steve smothers the prickle of hurt offence he feels at that look with the understanding that Natasha only let him see it out of trust. Or maybe to make a point, which will be annoying later, but Steve gets it regardless.

Bucky is Steve’s first and no one is going to do anything without Steve’s ultimate say. It’s not a level of control he’s ever wanted, but he’ll take it right along with every other bit of Bucky. “Bucky, rest with Natasha for a while,” he says gently, though it still makes Bucky tense for a fraction of a second. “It’s okay, she’s got you,” he says confidently, _trustingly_. Natasha doesn’t take it lightly; it’s clear in the way her scent stays controlled and faint, but sweetens all the same. But come to think of it, Natasha was probably just traipsing through the backwoods of Europe before she got to them. “ _Both_ of you should rest. We’ll get going in the morning.”

The words hit like permission and Bucky slumps trustingly into Natasha’s arms. Natasha doesn’t easily take suggestions, much less suggestions implying she may need to take a break for once, but today she doesn’t even put up the token resistance. Maybe it’s something about Bucky’s weight over her lap or the fact that she’s not the only one who needs her to stay down right now, but she just curls over Bucky protectively. Pressing her nose into his hair, she whispers something in quiet Russian that sounds like it involves the word “ _bossy_ ”, because Steve has heard the term before, if not nearly as fondly. It doesn’t make Bucky laugh, not quite, but he breathes like he almost wanted to.

There’s nothing to pack up, really, but Sam puts up the illusion of making sure their scant belongings are gathered. Then he joins Steve over at the washer and dryer stacked in the bathroom where he’s shoved all the sheets and borrowed towels. He knows he’s standing a little too stiffly, but can’t bring his shoulders down until Sam kisses his neck.

“Steve _…_ ”

“I’m not mad,” Steve starts, turning to rest his forehead on Sam’s shoulder before he can see the skeptical look on his face. “Not… _at_ anyone. Nobody here anyway.”

And that’s mostly true. Part of him is still thinking about Natasha asking Bucky to his knees with a tightness in his chest, a bit of impotence in the face of _his omega forced to kneel_. Alpha or not, had Natasha been anyone else, had she been even a little less critically important to him as a person, it would’ve been ugly all around.

But the thing is, Sam knows him well enough to read his face when he pushes him back, holds his gaze. Steve doesn’t want a lecture, but Sam is just as averse to being spoken down to and wouldn’t subject him to it. He just bumps Steve’s shoulder, nudges his thoughts away from that pit of _Alpha instincts_ telling him Natasha crossed a line.

“How many times do you think he was tricked into thinking things were okay just so someone could hurt him when he wasn’t braced for it?” is all Sam says and he doesn’t shy from Steve’s grief and anger even if it cuts through them like a hot knife.

Steve still winces a little at how sharp it is. “More than anyone should have.”

Sam scoffs, but it’s a hard sound of agreement more than an actual laugh. Steve goes still, though, watching closely when Sam’s expression folds. He squeezes his hand until Sam can gather his thoughts. “He trusts you,” he shrugs eventually. “At the bottom of his heart, above all things, he trusts _you_. Nat and I don’t have that luxury. And the last time he saw _her_ …”

“She was fresh out of The Red Room and probably trying to kill him, too?”

It’s a little harshly worded, maybe, but not wrong so Sam bypasses it gracefully. “He asked for her forgiveness and he got it. That part’s done, we got other shit to worry about.”

Looking off to the side through the open bathroom door, he can just see Natasha and Bucky’s legs from where they’ve moved close enough to lean on the couch, but not up off the floor. With his enhanced hearing, he can hear Bucky’s breathing— _slow and even, still_ —under Natasha quietly humming a song he doesn’t know.

There’s a peacefulness to all four of them being together in spite of everything that Steve hasn’t really felt before. A safehouse on the edge of nowhere and Steve feels _genuinely_ safer than he has in a very long time. It’s not over, not by a long shot, but they’re going home.

Bucky is _home_ and everything else will sort itself out.

Letting out a breath, Steve kisses Sam because this—the two of them—is the first home he found in the modern era. It means more than he has words to say right now that Sam is digging his heels in just as firmly as he is to keep this house standing.

“Thank you,” Steve says, nudging his nose under Sam’s ear, bearing Sam’s weight easily when he leans into him.

There’s no reason for either of them not to rest here a moment, too.


	7. Chapter 7

Most of the trip back to New York is lost to Bucky’s addled mind as effectively as if they’d put a bag over his head the whole way there.

Part of it he _does_ spend with his head in a bag, when nausea jolts him up out of Steve’s lap. The rest of the time he’s just too woozy to focus on anything but the cool feeling of Steve’s hands stroking his face. It’s almost too much, the kindness just as overwhelming as the shudders wracking his body, but that’s what he needs to cut through it all. He’s sick as hell in the back of a van driven by an Alpha he doesn’t really know, but this time, he’s got Steve’s smell pressed right against his face and Sam’s voice floating softly from the front seat.

If he was more aware of himself, he might be perturbed by how quickly his mind accepts those things as meaning he’s completely safe.

By the time they get to... wherever it is they’re going, Bucky is entirely dependent on Steve and Sam to direct him where he needs to be. Moving makes the world spin the wrong direction, but having a hand on the back of his neck or an arm around his shoulders is enough motivation to keep his feet moving forward.

Time doesn’t move quite right for the next few weeks, just gashes of awareness coming to him with increasing frequency until he’s able to actually remember the conversations passing around him.

Steve wipes his face and talks to him about the times Bucky vaguely remembers doing the same for him, the sense memory in his hands. Sam asks him if he thinks he can keep down rice and he nods, takes the bowl, and thinks it’s maybe the best thing he’s eaten in years. Steve sleeps curled along his back and only leaves him alone when Sam is there to hold him, too. Sometimes he thinks he should apologize, should stand up and take the pain without their help. He’s never been offered this level of care, it feels like more than he’ll be able to pay back. And maybe he even tries to say something like that, but Sam is shushing him, whispering, “Buck, I don’t speak Russian, but you’re okay. I _promise_ , it’s okay. Lay down, man,” and he does.

Bucky lays down and gets up and eats until he can do so without assistance. Until he stands up and strips the sheets and shoves them into the hamper, trying very hard not to react to Steve’s pride or Sam’s relief. He showers by himself and it feels a lot like waking up.

Even though the curtains are drawn and it smells a little like nobody used to live here, the fact that he’s allowed to move around unrestricted and _unsupervised_ is more than he’s had before. He tries to make good use of that freedom. First by doing a load of laundry, because he knows he is responsible for most of the dirty clothes, but hasn’t had to do anything about that.

Figuring out the new, futuristic washing machine takes more time than he’d like to admit.

“You don’t have to do that, Buck, you’re still recovering,” Steve tells him, when he sees him just standing in the laundry nook.

“Just twist the knob to ‘Normal’ and fill the detergent tray on the left,” Sam tells him, which is more helpful. It earns him a mildly betrayed look from Steve, but Sam squeezes his arm—and Bucky ignores the lurch of want in his chest—and nods his thanks at the instructions.

Without receiving any further instructions, Bucky does laundry and carefully watches what else they do around the house to try and anticipate it. He stops curling up under them, tries to prove his reliance on skin contact isn’t going to be a long term problem. Sam holds his arm out and Bucky shakes his head, sits next to him because he asked, but doesn’t touch. Steve asks him where he wants to sleep at night and Bucky indicates his own bed. He feels stable enough to consciously control himself, knows he doesn’t smell afraid. _Steve_ smells a little anxious, but he allows it, promises he’ll be right down the hall.

Bucky does sleep, but only in fits and starts. He turns his face into the pillow that still smells like them and that security leaks into his brain enough to let him rest.

The next morning, he wakes up as soon as their door opens and tries to stay out from under foot while shadowing them to figure out allowed activities. They aren’t leaving the house, he notices, but they do exercise in the attached carport so he takes the jump rope Sam offers and gets into the meditative motion of it while they sweat through their reps around him. Cooking is allowed, so he prepares the items Sam pulls out for breakfast, silently allows himself to accept the appreciation he gets for it and plans to do the same for Steve at lunch. They feed him too well—real food, even—for him not to help. Magazines are allowed and so is TV; he watches what they turn on, but picks up anything he can get his hands on to distract himself. He doesn’t need their touch, won’t let them think he’s gone weak on it.

They’re relieved, he knows they are, he can smell it on them. He doesn’t quite realize the anticipation in the air around them isn’t because they’re waiting on him to be good enough for something. They were trying to gauge his reaction to _them_.

Bucky only realizes this when he fails a test Steve wasn’t trying to give him. It should’ve been easy. Steve smiled at him, just happy to lay eyes on him, and reached to wrap an arm around his back on his way past him to bed. It’s a telegraphed movement, Bucky knows exactly what Steve wants and isn’t _scared_ , but he still feels all his muscles tense up in some weird hybrid fight-response.

Steve notices instantly and the ghost of warmth that was almost, _almost_ on him falls away instantly. The smell of Steve’s pain turns Bucky’s stomach.

In a flash, though, Steve is smiling, hands raised like the scent of his hurt isn’t still lingering in Bucky’s nose. “Sorry, got a little carried away,” he says, which is just— _dumbfounding._ Bucky has distinct memories of ‘getting carried away’ being the off-hand explanation that junior agents gave his handlers as to why Bucky was half-conscious and bleeding. Steve squeezing his shoulder in greeting, when he saw him coming no less, is not ‘getting carried away’ by any measure.

Bucky watches Steve recover feeling wrong-footed, an apology right at the back of his throat even if he doesn’t know exactly what he’s sorry for.

All of a sudden, the tiny distance left between their bodies in the wake of Bucky’s recovery feels less like safety and more solitude. They move around him with the same kind obviousness, but it’s not casual any more; it’s like Bucky flinched and made the space a solid wall. He’d already wanted them to touch him again so desperately, he doesn’t understand how it could have gotten worse when they still live right out of each other’s pockets.

A week of this has Bucky strung tight enough to hurt, trying desperately to hide it, prove he won’t burden them, but also not knowing what they _want._

Then he steps out into the main room to see Natasha standing in the front room and his back snaps straight before he even has to think about it.

Immediately, he inclines his head, turns out his wrists. “Alpha,” he greets softly, the ingrained instinct kicking in before he remembers Steve has warned him off that.

The look on Natasha’s face brings him back to his new reality as sharply as a slap in the face. “I’m not your Alpha,” she says coolly and Bucky feels that ice slide right down into his stomach. “You will call me Natasha.”

Something about the way she says it tugs at a memory he can’t quite pull into coherent shape. A much younger face gone red in the blistering cold, as unafraid of him as she is now. He almost asks, but can’t say for certain that isn’t when he shot her and he’d rather not remind her of any reasons she has to hurt him. “Natasha.”

Nodding, Natasha just takes a moment to look him over and Bucky just…lets himself be looked at. She’s never given any indication of being someone who won’t tell him exactly what she wants from him and if this is it, then fine. It’s easier than trying to answer any of Steve’s searching looks. He does his best, always will for Steve, but he’s not exactly a conversationalist. Not anymore.

Whatever Natasha sees just makes her tilt her head. Then she sits down on the floor.

Left standing over her leaves him so profoundly uncomfortable that he lowers himself to the ground as well without being asked. She doesn’t answer the confusion in his expression, just scoots back until she’s casually leaned against the wall, her arms resting on her knees. Unsure of what else to do, Bucky mirrors her, moves until his back is against the sofa. He doesn’t think he’s imagining the way her face softens for a moment, but then he’s a little distracted by the sound of Sam entering the room.

Sam isn’t subtle in the way he checks Bucky over, but Bucky isn’t tense—he’s making very sure of it—so Sam doesn’t tense either. Still, his voice is unsubtly suspicious when he says, “So, we practicing for the national staring contest or…?”

“We’re bonding,” Natasha answers, looking up at Sam. “You wanna distract Steve for a while?”

“ _Distract me from what?_ ” Steve calls, coming back down the hall. He doesn’t sound alarmed, not nearly as tense as he had the first time Natasha had shown up.

“Girls’ night. We’re gonna braid each other’s hair,” Natasha answers deadpan, undeterred by the flat look Steve gives her.

Rolling his eyes affectionately, Steve’s gaze is still a little concerned when he lets his eyes land on Bucky. His attention is the same mix of overwhelming and _not enough_ that makes Bucky’s stomach swim. “You good, Buck?” he asks and Bucky is uncomfortably touched by his protectiveness.

There’s an echo of tender annoyance in Bucky at that, like a memory of feeling something more than experiencing it right now. Now, he just tries to look as neutral as possible about this whole situation. Natasha said she wouldn’t hurt him and Bucky hasn’t been given a reason to disbelieve her. Even if he did, Steve wouldn’t allow her around if she was a threat and he trusts Steve’s dedication more than he trusts his own intuition.

That thought sits awkwardly against all his training, but he makes his squirm look more like a shrug. He nods. Then, adds a quiet, “Yeah, Stevie,” mostly for the way his voice always makes Steve smell happy, a task he can complete for him with a little thought.

Predictably, a smile flickers across Steve’s face, his scent going sweet and warm, even Sam smirking, fondly tired of both of them. Steve hesitates a beat longer, but Sam is actually easier for Bucky some days, the way he’s not tripping over a long history shredded down the middle. Bucky likes it, in a way he refuses to examine too closely, that when Sam’s hand falls on Steve’s bicep, Steve lets the touch lead him without question. It used to…

Did it used to be that easy for them?

“We’ll be right outside,” Steve assures him, turning fully into Sam’s hand. He looks at Sam, adoringly, and Bucky has desire clogging his throat. He doesn’t let it show on his face.

“I can Bucky-sit for five minutes unsupervised,” Natasha says, drawing Bucky’s gaze back to her only to find her already watching him like she sees right through him.

Somehow, Natasha cluing into the depths of his desire is less alarming than the idea of Steve finally piecing together exactly what’s got him crawling in his skin.

Bucky has almost worked up the courage to say “ _I don’t know if I know how to braid hair,_ ” when Natasha speaks up.

“ _You are treating them like they are one of us,_ ” she tells him flatly in Russian.

That wasn’t a question, so Bucky isn’t sure how to respond to it right off. He’s not even sure he knows what she’s implying, let alone how he should feel about it.

Natasha correctly reads his silence as uncertainty, nods towards where Bucky can just barely hear Sam and Steve talking in the garage. “ _You are treating them like they are one of us_ ,” she repeats. “ _Like kindness is just a test to make sure you will not fall for it, become reliant on it._ ”

Having it put into words like that makes something in his chest clench. “ _It is not good to become reliant on anything,_ ” he answers, what feels like by rote, but the words feel sour as soon as he says them in relation to Steve. The look on Natasha’s face implies she knows it, too.

“ _You are entirely reliant on kindness right now,_ ” Natasha tells him bluntly, but not cruelly. “ _Steve and Sam are the only things standing between you and an international manhunt. Unless you count me, I guess._ ”

Bucky has been in the dark about exactly what his status is here, too grateful to be upright and with Steve to question the exact circumstances. He knows he’s on borrowed time, has been since Hydra first got their hands on him. “ _Is this a warning?_ ” he asks around the sinking in his chest he’s more than used to ignoring. “ _I know this will not last,_ ” he assures her. “ _I can never do enough to deserve their kindness._ ”

“ _Of course not,_ ” Natasha replies immediately, frowning. She continues before Bucky’s dread can properly settle in, “ _It has never been about what we deserve. You and I would not be here at all if it was. It is only about what we choose_.” She nods down the hall, “ _What_ they _choose._ ”

Bucky can’t pull his words into the right shape at first, but Natasha watches him struggle patiently. “ _Do they know what they are choosing?_ ” he asks, eventually. Honestly, because he knows how much _Bucky Barnes_ used to mean to Steve Rogers, but that is only a fragment of who he is now, isn’t it? Even if they’ve managed to peel open the Winter Soldier, it’s only enough to see the wreckage of Bucky left inside him.

“ _Well, they get two people that would do literally anything for them, at least,_ ” Natasha shrugs like that isn’t a heavy thing to ask someone to carry. “ _Steve is not stupid. He can see all the ways you are not the same, but he can also see all the ways you_ are _._ ” She looks away then, intentionally, though she tries to pass it off as just letting her eyes drift around the room. “ _Sam and I worried that he was chasing a ghost. That when he finally found you there would be nothing left to bring home._ ”

The thought is so close to the front of Bucky’s mind, that for once he doesn’t know how to hold his tongue about it. “ _You know it would be safer for them if they had not._ ”

Natasha doesn’t respond right away, but he appreciates that she doesn’t try to mislead him. They both know it’s true. “ _Hydra left me my own ledger to clear, too. I did not want to hold my loved ones with blood on my hands,_ ” she admits. There’s a coldness to the words, something that leaves them lined up like soldiers for examination expecting to be executed if they fail. “ _But my friends do not fear the blood. They fear the loss of my touch._ ”

Bucky swallows, throat tight. “ _I do not know that my touch would be worth the blood spilt for it._ ”

“ _That is not your choice,_ ” Natasha shakes her head again. “ _This is not about worth, either._ ”

“Then what?” Bucky flops back into English to challenge a little roughly. A clanging warning drumming up his ribs at taking the sharp tone with an Alpha.

“Want _,_ ” Natasha answers placidly, her scent staying the same unruffled neutral as always. “Bucky, if they don’t know what you want, they can’t tell you if they want the same thing.” She motions around the house, with its plain walls but the lived-in scent of two Alphas who at the very least, care very deeply for him. “Do you want to be somewhere else?”

Bucky doesn’t fit in anywhere in the world, he’s known that since the first day Sam and Steve brought him in from the cold. But he also doesn’t _want_ to be anywhere but with his… with Steve and Sam. “No,” he answers. Not ever.

Natasha holds out a hand towards him. “Then let yourself be here.”

It would’ve been a trick; he can’t stop thinking, even now. Even after she showed up expecting nothing good from him and still forgave him, still held him with no ulterior motives. Even after Steve and Sam spent _weeks_ holding him just so he wouldn’t feel like he the withdrawal was worse than going back to the Chair.

It would’ve been a trick, before, but it’s not now. She waits him out as he looks at her hand in the space between them. His body unlocks in slow stages, but he shifts towards her and she’s not scared, doesn’t rebuke him when he reaches out.

Natasha’s hand is a little cool in his. The touch of a friendly Alpha makes something in his shoulders unknot so suddenly it almost aches.

“Bucky,” she says and he looks up from their hands. “What do you want?”

“From you?” Bucky asks.

Blinking once, Natasha gives him a challenging look even as her scent wafts out, an intimate allowance to witness her confusion. “I meant in general, but sure.”

Bucky responds by gently squeezing her hand. It’s not a real answer, but he doesn’t know how to articulate what he wants, because it encompasses more than just being touched. It’s sitting on the floor with him and speaking to him gently, like they’re kith and kin, like he’s not a danger. It’s being in a house where he can move around and safely take up space in the middle of a room. It’s Sam’s smile and voice and the taste of the food they make together, it’s the way Steve smells like all the best parts of his history and future combined. It’s being a _person_.

There’s no way Natasha got all of that off the look on his face, but she holds his hand tighter and confidently tells him, “You can have that.” Then she smirks a little, “Wanna clue in the boys so Steve stops smelling like a kicked puppy?”

Laughing isn’t quite a comfortable reflex again yet, but something close happens even if he winces a little. Steve isn’t going to punish him for a misstep, much less when Bucky didn’t realize what dance they were doing, but he still feels the uncomfortable weight of a slighted Alpha in the back of his mind.

It’s a little easier said than done when Natasha strokes his knuckles before she uncurls and stretches to her feet gracefully as a cat, tugging him up with her. “Get all that, Steve?” she calls, louder.

Steve had given them all the privacy he was able with super hearing and an anxious protectiveness still urging him back inside, Bucky knows that. He’s pretty sure Steve doesn’t speak Russian, but there’s no telling what he caught off the end.

The garage door opens. “Get all what?” Steve calls back.

Sam snorts. “Go find out.”

When Natasha drops his hand, Bucky feels like a fucking kindergartner being nudged into his first day of class alone. Steve walks in and immediately looks at him, face all open and sweet, and Bucky aches for him a little. He’s been so gentle and modest in his wanting, even as Bucky took back the touches they both needed. It makes him feel juvenile and _stupid_ when he offers Steve his hand, but it’s…the least he wants and the most he can muster right now.

It’s blatantly clear that Steve is trying to keep his expression neutral, but Bucky can smell the shift, the desperate relief in his scent. “You know you don’t have to?”

“I want to,” Bucky says. “Only if…” he looks between the three of them, swallows his nerves. “Only if it’s okay. I don’t… want to have to stop.”

Steve’s face falls, but before Bucky can get his frantic apology in the right order, Steve has taken his hand, pulled him forward a step. “Bucky, this is us,” he tells him firmly. “Whatever we have,” he motions between them, to Sam and Natasha, “Whatever we make of this, we get to keep, okay? I want…” He pinches his lips together.

It doesn’t matter at all what Steve is going to say, because Bucky would find a way to give it to him. Especially when he finally gets out, “Can I have a hug?” like he’s afraid, like Bucky would ever deny him anything.

“Yeah, Steve, _yes_ ,” Bucky replies and he’s pulled forward another two steps until he’s wrapped all up in Steve like he’s been longing for since the very second he stopped the last time. Steve isn’t subtle about turning his nose into Bucky’s hair and breathing so deeply Bucky mimics him on instinct. The smell of a loving Alpha melts all the tension right out of his spine, leaving him slumping against Steve’s chest, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt.

“There you are,” Steve breathes out, like he’s finally sitting down at the end of a very long day. The tone is enough to make Bucky’s eyes sting as he squeezes him back just as tightly. “There you are.”

Yeah, here he is.

And he’s not going anywhere, either.


	8. Chapter 8

It kind of annoys Sam that his father does turn out to be right, in some sense. Bucky _does_ sort of smell like home, but that’s less because he’s an omega and more because he smells like _Steve’s_.

They’re a matched set and Sam has gotten sucked into their orbit with no desire to leave. He catches glimpses of the man Bucky was before Hydra tried to unmake him, finds that he—even the rebuilt version—fits exactly alongside his idea of who Steve is. His love for him.

Sam is trying to sort out if he’s okay with the growing part of himself that just wants to shove his face in Bucky’s neck and never let him out of his sight again. He figures it’s not the healthiest mindset, but doesn’t berate himself too much. He knows better than to pull that shit and his private desires are his private business.

Besides, Steve is fighting a similar battle against his urge to coddle.

After the third time Steve tries to take something out of Bucky’s hands while he’s attempting to cook, Bucky takes him by the wrists. It’s a backwards display, one that swims interestingly in Sam’s chest. Normally Alphas hold that display of submission on their omegas, directing them where they’re wanted, holding them still in that wanting. The reflex is clearly natural between them, though, a relic of their younger days. For a moment, Steve goes charmingly pink across his cheeks and Bucky seems surprised with himself, but his alarm is short-lived when Steve just lets his arms relax into Bucky’s grasp.

The moment feels bubble fragile and Sam scarcely lets himself breathe as Bucky strokes his thumbs over the insides of Steve’s wrists. It breaks Steve open in the sweetest possible way, a near invisible tension falling out of his shoulders. When Bucky moves him, he follows until he’s led to the table where Sam is seated, down into the chair beside him.

Steve lets Bucky fold his hands and press them against the table in an unsubtle command to stay put _._

Sam snorts, shrugging when Steve shoots him a look. “Hey man, I tried to help, too, but I’m real familiar with getting popped on the hands for touching the cooking before—” He almost says _‘an om’_ changes course fast enough to get out “—the chef is done. Mama didn’t raise a fool.”

So Bucky cooks, because if he doesn’t do something he starts rattling out of his skin and it’s not like they’re going to put him to work, not the kind he’s been trained to do.

“ _I don’t feel right keeping him caged,_ ” Steve had said to the ceiling above Sam’s bed one night. The words have been stewing since Fury very generously hadn’t let them all get thrown in jail for harboring an international fugitive.

“ _I think we’re a little kinder than a super max, Steve,_ ” Sam had replied because he had to, even if he apologized for the thought by guiding Steve’s head to his chest.

Three cages—Sam’s house, Steve’s apartment, and Natasha’s anywhere—were still kinder than Bucky trying his luck at trial. He’s a half-feral omega ex-assassin whose only protection from the charges that could be called against is the fact that he doesn’t expressly exist in the eyes of the law. The brainwashing garnered sympathy among some officials, but it’s not like it’s a great argument _against_ him needing guardianship. If he needs Alpha supervision to be loose in public, hell, he’s got it and then some.

Bucky doesn’t care for being in public all that much anyway, but Sam gets Steve’s concern that he’s basically living his life around theirs.

Still, there are too many ghosts in Bucky’s head to leave any mental rooms unoccupied for long, Sam gets that, too. He also gets him cookbooks. Eases him into the modern world with TV and the outside world with excursions under a baseball cap. Sometimes he takes him to work, too, because if anybody would understand ducking and covering at the slightest noise, it’s the guys at the VA. They don’t pity him and he doesn’t scare them. Talking doesn’t come easily, but once Bucky gets started again, it’s clear he was a natural once and could be something close again.

Sam has started grocery shopping late at night so he can take Bucky with him when there tend to be fewer people. Bucky still sticks to him like a shadow, but he also isn’t chorded like he’s going to bite anyone that gets too close anymore. It gets to the point that he misses Bucky’s presence any time they aren’t there together, having grown used to increasingly less monosyllabic commentary.

“What do you want in your smoothies?” Sam asks as they’re walking through produce.

“Not ‘ _bananas’_ ,” Bucky grunts and Sam rolls his eyes. “They—”

“I’m gonna stop you there, I’ve heard this one before,” he says and grabs a bunch mostly to watch the disgust twist Bucky’s face, but also because banana pancakes are _good._ “You don’t have to eat _my_ bananas.”

“They’re _not right_.”

“Yeah, yeah, us young folk don’t know quality.”

“Respect your elders,” Bucky replies and Sam laughs, because it’s like that some days.

Some days it’s that easy for Sam to see how they would’ve been friends anyway, if by some different brushstroke of fate, Bucky had gone down with Steve, not before. It’s in the easy and oddly familiar bickering, almost like what he has with Steve minus being immediately enamored.

The more confidence Bucky has—in himself and his position beside Sam and Steve—the more he’s an _asshole_ and Sam can dish out his snark without worrying how every word might be misconstrued. Sam calls him “ _grandpa_ ” and Bucky glares at him, but smells amused. Bucky trips him when Sam goes jogging past and just runs when Sam tries to shove him.

Sam hasn’t quite gotten to the point of teasing Bucky about how Steve is tripping all over himself trying to _woo_ a man who is already desperately in love with him. Only because it’s alarmingly clear Bucky isn’t sure how to do this anymore. There’s always a moment of hesitation before he touches Steve, like he’s unnerved by how much the pause is shrinking by the day.

It leaves Sam’s throat tight with something unbearably sweet when, finally, Bucky reaches for Steve with familiarity and adoration, smiling and clasping him by the neck. Steve goes slack instantly and Sam has never more easily seen how small Steve can be under someone than when he lets himself fall into Bucky’s arms. A shudder works its way down Steve’s spine when Bucky rubs his chin over Steve’s head, holding him like a fragile thing. Some of Sam’s best moments with Steve have been when Steve has relaxed enough to let himself be cared for. Seeing it from the outside, with someone he trusts so completely, makes Sam feel weak with awe. He loves this.

…That’s as far as he lets himself take that thought. Even when Bucky glances over and catches him looking, but doesn’t flinch, doesn’t tease him. He just looks present and relaxed, gives a tiny nod and trustingly closes his eyes.

There have been little concessions of trust all along, after the initial leap where Bucky didn’t really have a choice but to trust him. Sam would like to think he’s since proven worthy of that trust. Sam trusts him in return. With being here, with being with _Steve_.

Today, though, Bucky is fiddling with a paper flower that is the exact shade of blue in Sam’s favorite shirt and Steve is blushing to the roots of his hair, smelling of anxiety and desire, and Sam thinks _oh_.

Sam may have to reevaluate the idea that Bucky doesn’t know _how_ to do this. Maybe it’s more he’s had the same question about whether or not he _should_ that’s been rattling around Steve and Sam’s heads. Maybe it’s just occurring to him, too, that Steve isn’t the only one being shared and Bucky is wondering how much of him Sam is willing to take.

Well, at the very least, Sam can take whatever a crinkly flower and the sweet, tentative look on Bucky’s face means. He can take miles past that and doesn’t bother trying to clamp down on the longing in his chest, knowing from Steve’s gasp that he can feel it.

Their fingers brush when Sam reaches for the flower and he leaves them there, breathes in Bucky’s surprised relief. “You know, there’s this place uptown that still sells penny candies if you really want to go steady?” he says and Bucky smells happy, so very happy even as his face twists into a scowl. Sam smiles at him, strokes his thumb over Bucky’s finger. “No, I’m serious, they have a soda counter and everything. I’ll even let you wear my letterman.”

Sam doesn’t actually have his letterman anymore, but he does let Bucky shrug into one of his jackets. He’s a perfect gentleman about how much it soothes something in his hindbrain that Bucky smells like him when they go out. It crosses his mind more than once—as they sit in _Whirly Top’s Pop Shop_ and share a root beer float like a bad teen movie—that he…wants this.

The way Bucky smells like home and Steve, how those smells are the same thing. He likes that he can almost always smell himself on them as well, because what home _doesn’t_ smell like you live there? He wants to think about Bucky in terms of _Mine_ , but also in terms of _Ours_ , because he wants to keep waking up next to Steve, who has lost so much of the quiet grief he used to carry through some nights. Home is Bucky coming into the apartment with Natasha, only for both of them to smirk when Steve smells like Sam has been making him sweat the whole time they were away.

This is what Sam has always been looking for.

It takes time, a lot of time, to get to the point that this path feels familiar with no surprise pitfalls. No, they know this route, know all the steps, know where their ghosts are hiding even if they can’t always guess when they’ll pop out, but they’re not _scared_. This is their home. They’re settling into this in a way that feels like—

(Sam has his own nightmares and Steve will lay on him, press him down until his body realizes he’s not falling and neither is anyone else. Bucky is there in the doorway, then in the bed so he can rest, heavy and whole, in Sam’s arms with his face tucked into his neck.)

(Steve will put down the shield inside the door, any of their doors, because wherever they are is home, and it’s like having their heart return to their chests. One day, maybe it’ll be all of them in one, but for now it’s enough that Steve comes home.)

(Bucky’s being a piece of shit because he thinks he’s _so fucking_ funny so Sam says, “Fuck you, man,” and Steve laughs, bright and loud, doesn’t stop even when Bucky kisses the corner of Sam’s mouth. The joy of it belongs to all of them.)

—like Sam doesn’t know how _not_ to do it for the rest of his life.

Bucky goes still when Sam approaches—obviously, so Bucky knows he’s coming—only to relax so much he slumps back against his chest when Sam noses at his neck, hands soft on his waist.

“Smell something you like?” he teases, and Sam can hear the smirk in his voice. Cheeky works for him, it really does, but Sam—with some reflex ingrained in him from being around Steve—still nips at his neck in mock warning.

Almost immediately, Sam is hit with the unfamiliar but unmistakable scent of Bucky’s arousal clouding up around his face.

It takes a lot of self-control not to jerk away when he realizes how close he is to active arousal himself. The way he can smell Bucky’s cold panic eroding the feeling makes it easy to push down as he carefully removes himself from Bucky’s back.

“Bucky, you’re okay. It’s okay,” Sam says, hearing Steve’s sharp inhale from across the room. He takes a few steps away. “Gonna give you some space, but you’re fine.”

Bucky doesn’t answer him right away, doesn’t even move as Steve gets up, hovering like he’s unsure if getting closer to him would be worse. There’s a pulsing fear radiating off him, but it doesn’t seem like it’s directed at Sam. He’s lost somewhere neither of them can reach.

“Bucky,” Steve calls softly, “Hey, Buck, it’s ok. Do you need us to leave?”

That seems to yank Bucky back to the present a bit, because he tenses further. Sam isn’t sure if he’s flinching or shaking his head, but he keeps his hands on the counter and his face away from them. He doesn’t speak, even when he manages to swallow and raise a hand towards Sam. Sam goes to take another step back, thinking he’s being waved off, but then Bucky reaches for him a little more pointedly. After a concerned pause, Sam steps forward, extending his hand without getting too far into Bucky’s space.

Bucky still doesn’t speak, but he squeezes Sam’s wrist. It’s not an apology, just silent reassurance for both of them before he moves away.

“Do you need to be alone?” Sam asks.

Bucky thinks about it, because he always does when they ask him things after they’ve tripped over a trigger they weren’t expecting. He shakes his head a little more obviously this time. “That…” he clears his throat, lets out a dry laugh. “Haven’t felt that in a while.”

The thought is so thoroughly sad and flattering that Sam doesn’t know what to do with it other than accept it. “Yeah? I have that effect on people, sorry, I’ll try to keep it in check.”

Bucky’s laugh is a little more genuine at that. Pushing his hair back, he mumbles something under his breath that Sam doesn’t catch. It didn’t sound like English, but it did sound fond. “I’m—I’ll be fine,” he says, shrugging like he’s settling back into his skin. “Let me get dinner done in peace, would you, punks?”

It’s a gentle dismissal and Sam takes it without it scraping his nerves. He follows Steve into the living room, not too far away that Bucky wouldn’t be able to hear them over the sound of his cooking. Sam almost wants to jump into his phone, but the smell of Bucky’s arousal is stuck in the back of his throat right alongside his fear at feeling it. There are things Sam will never understand as an Alpha, never understand as someone who hasn’t been intentionally tortured, but the idea of Bucky passing any heats in the hands of _Hydra_ —

Steve squeezes his neck and Sam lets himself sink into the feeling, lets it scatter those thoughts. He shudders into the comfort of Steve’s thumb digging into the tension in his muscles, shutting his eyes. Steve smells familiar and welcome around him; he focuses on that until the smell of sautéing onions and garlic take over the room.

Bucky is just about done when Natasha comes down the stairs where she _definitely_ hadn’t been an hour ago. Sam tells her he’s going to replace all the locks on his windows. She just looks at him like she’s more than up for the challenge, tugging Bucky’s hair before joining them to set the table. They don’t talk about the weird air over dinner. Natasha notices, it’d be odd if she didn’t, but she lets them carry on as normal. She and Sam harass Steve’s taste in music, they all get into an argument about the last baseball game Steve had subjected them to, catch up on Sam’s family, Natasha’s latest bureaucratic nonsense, and Bucky’s opinion on the Food Network.

Sam has work in the morning so he’s headed for bed even as Steve and Natasha stay on the couch, her feet tucked up under his thigh. He pulls Steve’s hair until he leans his head back against the sofa to smile into a kiss. Natasha rolls her eyes dramatically, but only swats him lightly when he tugs her hair for it. There’s only a split second of hesitation before he leans towards Bucky, a slow move towards his cheek that Bucky turns to meet with his lips, chiding. Sam shrugs and pecks him again for good measure before heading off to shower.

Coming out of the bathroom, Sam nearly jumps out of his skin when in the space between grabbing a shirt and pulling it over his head, Bucky materializes in the bedroom doorway. “Yeah, real funny. Keep it up and I’ll put a bell on you,” he snaps when Bucky smirks at him.

“Can I come in?” Bucky asks.

“Sure, of course,” Sam answers. “What’s up?”

It looks like Bucky wants to talk, which is not a usual look to find on his face. He more often than not will clam up, barely let the words slip between his teeth after so many years of being forced to suffer in silence. Now, though, he walks up to Sam and holds his gaze even as he reaches to take his hand and gathers his thoughts. “About earlier…”

Sam doesn’t dismiss the implication, not when Bucky so obviously has something to say. “Yeah?”

“It wasn’t _you_ ,” Bucky says firmly. “It wasn’t _bad_ , I just…” His mouth twists and he shakes his head, dismissing whatever he was about to say. “I trust you.”

Sam nods, “I appreciate that.” He squeezes Bucky’s hand. “But give your body some time to get the memo, too, okay?”

Bucky is still holding himself a little stiffly, but gently pulls Sam forward into a kiss. It’s a chaste thing, but it still trips his pulse, makes Bucky’s scent into a braid of nerves and arousal tugging tight around Sam’s heart. Sam keeps his hands low and lets him kiss him until their breaths are shaking. Bucky pulls back first. “It might be a while,” he confesses.

“We have a while,” Sam assures him softly.

“More than a while,” Steve’s voice agrees from behind them. He looks so soft and adoring when Sam looks up, he doesn’t know how he could ever forget this feeling right here.


	9. Chapter 9

For the most part, Bucky thinks he believes them.

The days where he wakes up and isn’t quite sure where he is are fewer and further between than last year. Steve is familiar in a way he had never really unlearned, even if The Chair had shoved it down so far he hadn’t recognized it. It helps that no matter where he wakes up—at Sam’s place or any of the places Natasha is staying that week—he is constantly followed by Steve’s scent. And not just because Steve is leaving him clothes, but because Sam’s smell is so intrinsically mixed into his.

The longer Bucky stays here, the more those scents come to mean the same thing—home and safety and _love_. It’s a gamble, keeping him, tying their fate to his, but they’ve done it and never once made him think it wasn’t worth it. On his worst days, _he_ questions it, but it would take more than an apocalypse to drag him away from his Alphas.

Thinking of them as _his Alphas_ is probably not something Bucky should allow himself, but legally speaking, he’s not wrong. He doesn’t even think they would mind if he were to say it out loud. Vaguely, he can remember giving that to Steve many, _many_ years ago—when Steve was still small enough that Bucky could kneel with his face nearly at his sternum. The hands are much bigger now, but he can easily imagine the same rush of joy and love, can remember the scent easily because Steve still smells of it some days, even without Bucky saying the words.

 _Alpha_ , sits right on the tip of his tongue so often when he talks to them.

At first because it was always a safer bet when dealing with strange Alphas, but they hadn’t liked that, hadn’t demanded it of him. They don’t knock their names out of his mouth, they welcome them and so he uses them and _loves_ it, but… Steve comes home from a mission and goes slack at the sight of them and Bucky wants to sink to his knees and greet him, _Alpha_. When Sam brings him a new cookbook, or wears Bucky’s clothes, when he’d nipped playfully at Bucky’s neck, _Alpha, Alpha, Alpha_.

They’d take it, Bucky thinks, they’d let him give it to them if he could just find the words to ask.

Bucky’s body doesn’t wait for him to make that call, though.

It’s been so long since he’s had a heat, he doesn’t even register what’s happening right away. There have been little symptoms for _days,_ but when he wakes up having sweated through his sheets, his first thought is that maybe Steve got cold last night and cut the AC too low. When the thought of Steve sends a slow burn through his whole body, right down to where he realizes he is _actively_ hard, for maybe the first time this decade, his brain flies into panic mode.

They’d talked about this, as much as they could when the words continually shriveled up on Bucky’s tongue. He’d declined any drugs, the memory of the sharp tang of chemicals stealing his mind from himself jamming tight into his throat. He’d known what would be coming and somehow it’s still a shock to feel the queasy, needy twist in his stomach. They probably will already be able to smell it on him and—

Bucky _wants._

Until Sam had brought him back to Steve out of that lab what feels like forever ago, Bucky had given up wanting. The Asset did not exist to get what it wanted; it didn’t matter if it was hungry, or hurt, or exhausted or _in heat_ , none of it mattered. All that mattered is what it was told to do and _Bucky’s not a fucking ‘it’ anymore._ Bucky doesn’t have to choke down food he doesn’t like, he can complain about the taste of bananas and cook what he wants, whenever he gets hungry. If he’s tired, he can rest, he can _rest_ and it’s not treated like a privilege or a theft, they tell him he can get some sleep.

They’re so gentle with him when it comes down to it, when it really counts. He wishes they wouldn’t be, that they didn’t feel like they _had_ to be. Now, especially now, it’s not what he wants. He doesn’t want them to tiptoe around him, to keep their hands and mouths to themselves. They’ve proven so many times that they won’t hurt him, that they will keep him safe, whoever they have to fight to do so.

Loyal and immovable, they would take him _miles_ away from the feeling that is taking a heat alone. He can imagine it, can’t _stop_ imagining it, their hands on him, _in_ him, their _teeth—_

The sense memory of Sam’s teasing bite has Bucky flying out of bed to stand shivering in the shower within two minutes. It won’t work, not for long, but the cold water is soothing to his body if not his thoughts.

It feels like too much to ask for when he knows they’ll give it.

Bucky doesn’t know if they understand what they’ll be in for.

Maybe he’s in the shower too long, or maybe Steve just has an eerily good sense of when Bucky is in distress, but Bucky hears him coming down the hall and still jumps when he knocks. “ _Hey Buck, breakfast is on, you coming?_ ”

Not answering is not going to work, because Steve respects his privacy but if he even gets a whiff of distress, it’s going to take much more than a door to keep him out of this room. Bucky pulls on a hoodie, tugs it a little tighter around himself reflexively, even though he knows it won’t do anything to hide the growing smell of his heat. Swallowing, he gets himself in a loop of remembering that Steve will not—nobody in this house is going to make him suffer for his _cycle_.

Seeing Steve outside the door, freshly showered after his run and smiling like Bucky is more than enough reason to smile is temptation in its worst form. His smile goes away in a blink when he gets a proper smell of the room. His eyes blow wide, nostrils flaring slightly. He gets caught half-way between stepping forward and flinging himself backwards, instead stands frozen in the doorway. “Oh.”

“Not yet,” Bucky makes himself choke out, even though a distant bell is ringing in his body telling him to present himself as an offering and let himself be taken however Steve will have him. The image—maybe it’s a memory, _shit_ , it could be a memory—of what that would mean from Steve sweeps him so thoroughly with arousal he feels himself go slick and weak-kneed.

The door closes on Steve saying, “Okay.” His voice is a little high, strained, but he clears his throat and doesn’t open the door again. “I’m—Okay, Buck, I’ll put your food outside the door for now and, uh…” Bucky sits down on the edge of the bed as he speaks. “We can leave you some, uh... _stuff_ later? We’ll—You know we won’t…”

Bucky puts his head in his hands. “Yeah, okay,” he says, because, no _,_ Sam and Steve, however affected they may be by his scent, would never take anything Bucky doesn’t want to give them.

The thing is, Bucky _does want_ , so badly it’s choking him. He doesn’t know if he’s going to be able to stay strong enough to resist with Steve looking at him, all earnest and willing.

True to his word, Steve leaves a truly massive breakfast outside the bedroom door. Bucky is nearly sick with how much he loves this man, but manages to eat all of his breakfast right down to the cup of Sam’s shitty digestive tea.

Every few moments, he thinks to call out to them, to ask them what they’re willing to do and negotiate the terms. It’s not even that bad, not yet, he’s still present and aware, but he’s already dangerously close to begging.

There’s no way he can let them see him once the heat really hits.

*

In recent memory, Bucky is sure he has suffered much worse things than a heat spent alone.

The memories are indistinct, most lost in a haze of drugs and pain, but none of them involve a furnished bedroom that only smells like him and Alphas he trusts with his life. He wasn’t as well fed and well rested as he is today, and he certainly wasn’t safe. As promised, Steve and Sam have not come in, Sam only passing by once to knock on the door.

“ _Hey, I’m gonna leave something by the door for you. It’s not prescription, but I have it on good authority that it’s pretty good?_ ” Sam tells him through the door. “ _If you need help, we’ll... be around, okay?_ ” he adds on stiltedly, already moving back down the hall.

Bucky waits a full thirty seconds to open the door. The smell of Sam lingering there, the worry under his musk, has Bucky smothering a quiet sound in the back of his throat.

Now, he’s seated on the floor by his bed, head bowed as he shivers against the coming waves of his heat.

The bag is on the floor beside him, the heat toys and a container of _4REAL ALPHA - PSEUDO MUSK LUBRICANT_ inside entirely unopened. He doesn’t want fake, the idea of it has his stomach roiling. He keeps his nose pressed against one of Steve’s shirts, greedily stealing his scent as he gropes under the nightstand for the emergency phone they’d given him. It’s got a grand total of three numbers programmed in it, but it’s all he can do and be sure he won’t succumb to temptation in a moment of weakness.

Natasha answers on the third ring. “ _Grandpa is finally using his cell phone?_ ” she answers lightly. The sound of her voice, safely filtered through a phone miles away, makes him feel marginally less like he’s going to explode. It won’t work for long. “ _What’s wrong?_ ”

The admission catches in his throat. He covers his face, feeling stupid for calling her, but entirely unable to hang up the phone. “My heat’s starting.”

“ _Oh, yeah? Is that a problem?_ ”

What a fucking question. “I don’t know what to do.”

Bucky can’t read the pause the follows over the phone, probably wouldn’t even be able to even if he could see Natasha’s face. So he’s in no way prepared for, “ _Well, I’ve never given The Birds and The Bees Talk, but if you want me to google—_ ”

“Nat,” Bucky snaps, his annoyance only winning out because he’s too stressed to be amused.

“ _No, seriously. That’s about all I can do for you,_ ” Natasha continues, but her voice is uncharacteristically gentle. “ _If you want me to sit on the phone with you, I can do that, but I think you have two better options there with you, no?_ ”

The question fills him with the same desire and despair he’s been cycling between since he woke up this morning thinking about Steve—flashes of what must be real memories, a body much smaller than his and cool hands heating up against his body—and Sam’s smiling voice right behind his ear, his mouth at his throat. He presses his legs together, hiding his face in Steve’s shirt, choked up for more reasons than he can put into words.

Natasha reads his silence with more accuracy than he’d read hers.

“ _You know they’d take care of you,_ ” she says when he doesn’t respond. It’s not quite a reassurance, but also too flat to be a proper question. She sounds actively confused as to why he’s holed up in his bedroom on the phone when he’s got two very loving Alphas down the hall trying not to scare him with how badly they want him.

Bucky shaking his head even though she can’t see it. “I can’t be… M’not the same as before.”

It feels stupid as soon as he says it out loud; it’s so indisputably true nobody has ever even called it into question. Bucky’s idea of himself may have only recently started to reassert itself, but Steve’s got a ghost of Bucky living in his head, too. A version of him that wanted Steve in a way that was far less complicated, didn’t have quite as much scar tissue.

Soldiers all have scars, even Steve and Sam haven’t managed to escape that. But they aren’t marked with the teeth of bored, sloppy Alphas who didn’t see any reason to control themselves with their latest toy when putting it back in The Chair would cleanse them of its tethers anyway.

“ _Steve was a hundred pound asthamtic and Sam never even knew you before,_ ” Natasha reminds him. “ _This is the you we love._ ”

Hearing the words is at once uncomfortably discordant and extremely comforting. Bucky wants so badly for it to be true, has seen all the ways it _is_ true, and all the same…

“That’s too… I can’t ask that, Nat. Not on top of everything else,” Bucky mutters, letting the shirt drop to close a hand around the back of his own neck.

“ _Sam and Steve are two of the most bullheaded Alphas on the planet,_ ” she says, with the same fond annoyance she always addresses them with. “ _If they didn’t want this, didn’t love this, they wouldn’t do it._ ” Then she pauses, her voice gone quiet and serious. “ _Steve and Sam won’t let you make yourself into a monster on them. None of us will. They’ll tell you no if they have to,_ _but when have they ever told you to not even_ ask _for something?_ ”

Bucky lets that thought sit for a moment, tries to conjure up the image of any of them punishing him for a _question_ and he can’t even put that idea together. Silence has never been demanded of him, not in this house. He’s allowed to want.

Right now, he wants Steve and Sam so badly it’s got him shaking.

“Never,” he agrees. “They’ve never said—It’s still a hell of a thing to ask.”

“ _Maybe not if they want it, too. Go talk to them,_ ” she says and it’s the only direct order he’s been given by anyone in months. The words don’t twist in his chest, don’t make him feel like he’ll be sick if he doesn’t obey them. It feels like Natasha is lending him her confidence and he takes it with open hands, needing it to get out of this room.

Bucky takes a deep breath. “Thanks, Nat,” he says as he gets to his feet, only slightly unsteady. “I’m gonna, uh…”

Natasha snorts. “ _I don’t need the details. Call me next time you’re upright_ ,” she tells him bluntly. The call disconnects before he can decide whether or not to give into the urge to tell her to fuck off. He just sighs again, looking down at the phone until a renewed ache in his stomach has him swaying, finally putting the phone and old shirt aside to head for the door.

Steve must hear him coming, because Bucky can hear his voice cut off abruptly when he nears the bedroom door. As nervous as he may be, Bucky is far too proud—and maybe edging into being too desperate, as well—to turn back now. He knocks and hears someone get to their feet before Steve pulls the door open. “Hey, Buck, you okay?”

The smell of their concern and arousal is so thick in the room Bucky has to swallow against it. “Can I talk to you guys?” he clears his throat, “About…” He motions at himself, where he’s managed to sweat through parts of his shirt and probably smells stronger than they do.

“Yeah, of course,” Steve answers. “What’s—?”

“You wanna let him in or what?” Sam teases lightly before Bucky can, but they both laugh at the embarrassed look Steve shoots him.

There were so many times before where walking into a room reeking of Alpha musk would’ve sent Bucky into a spiral, locked down where nothing could really touch him. Now, stepping past Steve and being surrounded by their scent feels like being wrapped in a blanket. They’re not going to be like anyone he’s ever been with before, it won’t even be like it was with Steve before.

This is a whole new playing field for all of them.

Bucky can’t find his words for a moment, but they give him the time they’ve always promised. “I want…” he clears his throat. “I want your help,” he admits softly, “but… I can’t be what I was.”

Steve’s face crumbles. “ _Buck…_ ”

“And I know—I know that you’re not the same, either, Stevie,” Bucky says, before turning to Sam. “And _you_ , you care about me, too.” He laughs, the sound a little damp. “You treat me like I’m…”

 _Yours_ , is what he thinks, but can’t quite make himself say it yet. Swallowing again, Bucky looks down. “I don’t know how to be had anymore.”

The swelling of silence that follows is heavy and Bucky doesn’t quite know what will happen when it breaks.

Sam breaks it when he stands up from the bed. He comes forward and Bucky waits for the fear that never comes, even when Sam’s hands find his sides. The touch is a relief so profound it seems like it should have its own name. He lists into it, sucking in the soothing smell of Sam’s musk. He shudders when Sam drops a kiss to his shoulder.

“Bucky, we already _have_ you. You’re ours,” he tells him. “Even if you never want to be bitten again, you’ll still be ours.”

…That sure feels like a hell of a promise to make, even in the modern day.

It rings true, though. Even when they’re drowning in his pheromones, they haven’t rushed him, haven’t _taken_ anything. He’s not a toy to them, something to be marked up and thrown away on a whim.

The shock must shoot through his scent, though, because Sam squeezes his sides and continues. “If you want us to help you through this, we will. If you want us to get you a prescription for pseudo musk and leave you alone every single heat, we will.” He pushes Buck back to look in his face. “You’re not having any more claims forced on you.”

“Never again,” Steve growls and Bucky nearly sinks to his knees at the sound of it, Sam’s arms keeping him upright even as he goes slick. “Bucky, you’re your own person.”

“But I do want—I’m—” Bucky has to take a step back before he can speak, but he can’t make himself let go of Sam entirely, gripping a handful of his shirt as he looks between them. “I want to be _yours_ , Alphas.”

Sam swears sharply, the smell of desire rolling off him in warm waves. “Bucky…”

“ _Please,_ ” Bucky says, baring his neck submissively.

Steve is on him, kissing him like he needs it more than air. “ _Omega Mine,_ ” he growls against his lips and if Bucky weren’t tripping down the stairs into a full-blown heat before then, he sure is now.

Sam and Steve catch him before he can hit the ground, though.

It’s been so long since a heat has felt like anything other than shame and pain that Bucky is out of his head with pleasure. Steve smells like all the safety of being home, for good, _forever_ and Sam smells like the joy of being alive and loved beyond all reason or doubt. Their hands are grounding on him even as they string him out, turning him on more than should be possible given how turned on he already is. The way they move is not quite natural yet—they’ve never had anyone to share—but there’s something charming about the way their hands bump and bodies press together to get to the same spot on Bucky.

Nothing ever sparks any tension towards each other, all their focus lavished over Bucky who hadn’t realized _how_ starved he was until they filled him up, willingly, completely.

A mating claim, _two_ mating claims on either side of his neck.

The pain is nothing, the pain hardly registers through feeling the bond burst open between them. Steve’s love, felt from the inside, is so familiar to him it makes him want to scream that he ever forgot it. It’s absurd, like forgetting what it’s like to breathe. Sam, though, is the kind of love that’s swelling and tender. For all their sharp words, Sam is a wholly devoted Alpha who loves _him_ and has never lied about it _once._ He loves these two so much, he loves them, _he loves them and_ —

Bucky does scream; he doesn’t mean too, but they’ve pushed him well past the point where he can control himself. He doesn’t need to, though, they’ve got him. So he cries out for them—a short, torn thing that bleeds into whimpering.

They don’t shush him. Steve growls, rocking deeper into him, and Sam ruts against him, murmuring his name again and again, rough and adoring.

This time, when Bucky comes back to himself, it’s to Steve still inside him, nosing at the back of his neck, mumbling, “I hadn’t… I haven’t felt right in a long time.”

Sam hums, nuzzled up close against Bucky’s face, gently rubbing at his thigh where it’s tossed over his waist. “You haven’t been _home_ in a long time.”

Any other day, Bucky would rib them for being so sweet on each other, so soft on him. Right now, though, Bucky is feeling as whole and loved as he ever has. The low rumble of their voices brings tears to his eyes. Sam notices first, right away and shifts to look at him with a smile. “Hey, babe, back with us?” he asks gently.

Bucky nods, but can’t look at him—in all his warmth and affection—without going back to pieces. He wants to stay up for a little while longer before the heat takes him under again. Tucking his face against Sam’s neck makes his Alphas shift tighter against him like they aren’t already as tangled as can be. “Alphas?” he says, the word still a bright jolt of joy through all of them, joy that Bucky can _sense_ now.

“Omega Mine?” they answer in chorus, with the same spark of joy.

“Thank you for bringing me home,” Bucky tells them with more sincerity than he’s ever felt towards any other words in his life.

If they’re not careful, they’ll get wrapped up in a loop of the feeling, but Bucky realizes they don’t _have_ to be careful. They’re safe and they can bask in the feeling of being united without consequence.

Bucky has almost forgotten how good it feels to throw caution to the wind and just let what happens happen. Steve and Sam have already proven themselves to be just as reckless in love, but not towards him. They won’t let him fall, not alone anyway.

They crash back into the waves together, joyously in love and safely wrapped in each other.


	10. Epilogue

All things considered, in the trajectory of Natasha’s life, getting shot by The Winter Soldier makes more sense than making dinner with Bucky Barnes in his kitchen.

There’s a deep-rooted sense of paranoia in her, the vigilance that has kept her alive thus far, that should still be leery around him. The absence of that hyperawareness still alarms her some days. Whatever part of her that registered him as a threat has scabbed over in the face of this weird new reality they live in nowadays.

Today, she shows up as expected after spending some time alone to come down from a mission and lets herself in with her spare key. Bucky doesn’t turn his wrists out at her any more, looks right at her and smiles, bumps his forehead against the top of her head. “Welcome back. I was thinking zharkoye tonight?”

“Sure,” she says, leaning into the motion and leaving her keys in the bowl by the door. “Where are the boys?”

“Out back. Mrs. Wilson called to give Steve a piece of her mind about that bonehead stunt with the semi-truck last week,” Bucky answers and Natasha snorts about how pleased he sounds to not be the only one scolding his Alpha.

They move around the kitchen in a comfortable silence after that. Bucky is barefoot with his hair twisted into a tie he stole from her weeks ago and Natasha doesn’t think twice about the knife in his hands. She takes a sip of his drink and he tells her about picking up part-time shifts with Sam, the people he meets at the VA. They chop vegetables and Natasha brags about the little bracelet Clint’s kids made her now that she’s home and can wear it freely.

Every part of her is safe in these walls, even if she double checks to make sure her Pack is safe here, too. They finish cooking and she breaks away silently to patrol the halls in the fading sunlight, feeling a sense of peace she rarely gets anywhere else. Dinner is cooking on the stove and Bucky is arranging the den into what could generously be called a nest. The windows and doors are locked and alarmed, except for the door to the back patio where she can faintly hear Sam laughing, Steve’s words murky but laced with the reassurance of a scolded child who almost got hurt.

There aren’t many pictures on the walls, but there are more than a few of Steve’s studies of them framed. Natasha holding arabesque (because Bucky had bet her she couldn’t anymore) and Bucky meditating with his hair a mess around his head (before Sam’s hand tangled in it to bring him back up) and Sam’s hands wrapped around an atlas of America’s birds (because Steve thinks he’s funny, but joke’s on him, Sam loves it). The door to Sam’s room is open, his bed made up with brutal corners and a picture of all his nieces piled on his back on the dresser nearest the door.

Natasha turns around and pauses at the guest room. She is essentially the only one to use it and now… She touches the arrow stenciled on the door and thinks about how she’s living in a dreamworld. Bucky is courteously noisy when he approaches, but she doesn’t turn right away.

“ _It is crazy, right?_ ” he says in Russian as he steps up beside her. “ _That all that shit led to them?_ ”

“ _It is,_ ” Natasha agrees, finally managing to look up at him.

Bucky has extremely kind eyes, nothing Hydra ever did was able to kill that in him. He has older scars that she knows must hurt like dying some nights, but the freshest ones—the ones given and received out of the kind of love that Natasha, for many years, doubted even existed—he wears proudly, takes comfort in. She does, too, actually. He smells healthy and loved, which is more than any of them could’ve hoped for after that first fight on the bridge. It’s certainly more than she expected.

“ _Think we earned it, though, no?_ ” she continues, keeping her voice level.

Bucky sighs a little, but it’s not a strained sound. He squeezes her arm and she lets them both have that moment of comfort. “ _Yeah, Natalia, I think we earned it_.”

The fact that either of them honestly believe that is almost enough to choke her up.

In the den, the sectional futon is pulled out and stacked high with comforters and pillows. By the time Steve is finished getting scolded and loved on, dinner is ready, too. Sam and Steve press close to greet her, the smell of her friends welcome and heartening up close, before they all get settled.

Steve walks in with a tray of bowls; modest sizes for Natasha and Sam and the super soldier sized bowls for Bucky and himself. Bucky climbs into the middle of his nest without hesitation, Natasha falling in beside him. Sam settles in beside her as Steve hands out their bowls before taking a seat himself tight against Bucky’s side.

They’re going to argue about what to watch on TV, because Sam is determined to make Steve and Bucky watch his cultural milestones. Or what to turn on the radio, because Bucky’s taken to radio dramas lately like the old man he is. It’s all for fun, though, because they’re probably going to turn on some mindless game show that Natasha will crush them at, even when she is only half paying attention.

The evening settles in around them, easily familiar after the long process of finding their groove. It can’t be this way every time, not when there’s still a world that needs its Avengers. Natasha still has a ledger to clear.

Bucky is getting closer and closer to the day that he won’t be able to let his Alphas jump into battle without him, even with Natasha watching their six. They won’t stop him when that day comes, but those are thoughts they don’t need to address tonight when they’re all nestled safely together. So, Natasha leans back into Sam’s chest, full and content while Bucky and Steve tuck into their second bowls.

Outside life can take care of itself for a while and so can the future. Bucky looks over at her, smelling bright and happy with a mouth full of stew and she doesn’t question what this is, what it will always be, even for her.

Home is anywhere your pack is and it’s good to finally have one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! 2020 has really been one thing after another (and several overlapping things, too!!!) so I hope this was a good little break from the chaos. Remember to look after yourselves and each other.
> 
> And of course, another big thank you to ZepysGirl and the truly awesome beta readers!
> 
> I would love to know what any of you thought, by way of words, emojis, or gifs! Cheers!


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